In June 2014 the Center for Public Integrity — in partnership with “Reveal,” an investigative radio program produced by the Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, and Michigan Radio — unveiled a shocking story of political interference in an urgent matter of public health. In “Politics of Poison,” CPI reporter David Heath found that a single member of Congress used a little-known legislative ploy to stop the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from publishing its new scientific findings on the dangers of arsenic. It’s a rare inside look at mechanics of lobbying, and how it can have a serious impact on all of us. We all consume small amounts of arsenic, sometimes in our drinking water, often in our rice, even in our beer and wine. EPA scientists had determined that the current drinking-water standard for arsenic was still potentially deadly. In fact, the EPA determined that if you drank the legal limit of arsenic every day, you had nearly a 1 percent chance of getting lung or bladder cancer. But the congressman, Mike Simpson, an Idaho Republican, said he was concerned that small communities couldn’t meet tougher drinking water standards. So he questioned the EPA’s ability to do science. He secretly inserted language in a report attached to the 2012 spending bill that ordered the EPA to turn its work over to the National Academy of Sciences. That may not sound so bad, but it’s a common delay tactic used by the chemical industry. This was all done in secret. Even other members of the House Appropriations Committee had no idea who was behind the delay. Yet Heath found traces of evidences in various documents pointing to Simpson. When the Congressman failed to respond to calls and emails, Heath tracked Simpson down in the hallway outside a hearing and got him to confess. What really makes the story unusual is that Heath also got the lobbyist and one of the companies that sought the delay to sit down for a lengthy interview. Two pesticide companies sell a weed killer containing arsenic. If they could delay the EPA report, they could actually lift an EPA ban on their product. Their strategy worked. And as a result, arsenic is still being sprayed on golf courses, next to highways and in cotton fields. Research suggests that this arsenic ends up in our drinking water. It’s unclear now when the agency’s arsenic review will be finished, even though scores of studies have linked arsenic not just to cancer, but also to heart disease, diabetes and strokes. People like Wendy Brennan, who lives in rural Maine with her two daughters and two grandchildren, have been left to worry about all the arsenic-tainted water they’ve consumed. Brennan participated in a study by Columbia University researchers, where she first learned she had arsenic in her water. “My eldest daughter said … ’You’re feeding us rat poison,’ ” Brennan said. “I said, ’Not really,’ but I guess essentially, that is what you’re doing. You’re poisoning your kids.” On June 28, CPI published two stories and an interactive map; follow-up pieces were published in July and December. A 16-minute “Reveal” segment, with Heath as correspondent, aired on some 200 public radio stations beginning June 28. On June 30, Michigan Radio launched a five-part series that focused on the arsenic problem in that state.
