The Lever - 🧟 A retreat in the war on zombies

🔥 Today’s Lever story (attached below): Trump just withdrew safety rules for pipelines that created a real-life zombie emergency in America.

🎧 On Lever Time: Americans are mad as hell. Here’s why.

⬇️ Spend four minutes reading this 967-word newsletter to learn about:

• How Ted Cruz’s new corruption scheme could increase the price of cars.
• A former DOJ attorney’s last-minute gift for her new clients.
• The secret society jacking up your electricity rates.
• Who’s stripping Joann Fabrics for parts.
• The successful bullying of a Georgia Congressman.

🔌 A secret society is fleecing you. New data show that in the last three years, private corporate utilities have jacked up electricity rates 49 percent more than the rate of inflation, while publicly owned utilities have raised rates 44 percent less than the rate of inflation. Since private companies provide 70 percent of American electricity, this scheme is probably ripping you off right now. Blame state regulators — and this secret society of consultants.

🤐 USAID’s new gag order. According to government documents shared with The Lever, staff at the embattled U.S. Agency for International Development are raising alarms after the Trump administration moved to potentially block the public from accessing agency records. On Feb. 18 USAID administrators began adding cryptic new language at the bottom of agency emails stating “Sensitive But Unclassified” — a designation that could illegally exempt the emails from public records requests. 

• Documents show nearly a dozen USAID employees have filed internal complaints over the new classification footer, which covers all of the agency’s emails since the Trump administration abruptly closed its headquarters.

📈 SEC retreats on reigning in crypto. The Securities and Exchange Commission closed its investigation into the crypto arm of digital trading platform Robinhood this week after the cryptocurrency industry spent more than a quarter of a billion dollars trying to get its allies elected in 2024. Days before, the SEC dropped a lawsuit against Coinbase and paused an investigation into Binance after previously accusing the crypto platforms of operating as unlicensed securities exchanges.

🎁 DOJ attorney left a last-minute gift for her future clients. Months after issuing corporations a get-out-of-jail free card from inside the government, former Biden Justice Department official Nicole Argentieri is joining a ritzy Manhattan law firm to advise corporate clients on how to avoid litigation. In November, Argentieri announced a new DOJ policy allowing firms accused of misconduct to avoid prosecution as long as executives “act in good faith” to disclose wrongdoing. 

😢 Private equity killed the craft store. Joann Fabric is going out of business — despite previously announcing it would keep some stores open — after the legacy craft store was auctioned off to the private equity firm GA Group, which has decided to strip it for parts. The only chain options left for crafty people now are Michaels — acquired by private equity giant Apollo Global Management in 2021 — and Hobby Lobby, owned by conservative billionaire Trump supporters.

They can't scam who they can't find.

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The Financial Times (2/23/2024)

Are the protests working? A Georgia Republican is publicly begging Trump to slow his federal worker firing spree after receiving overwhelmingly negative feedback during a town hall on Thursday. Last week, Rep. Rich McCormick was confronted with boos and jeers and was asked to “rein in the megalomaniac in the White House” by his constituents. Now, he’s publicly calling on Musk and his associates to practice caution as DOGE steamrolls through the federal bureaucracy. 

You might remember McCormick from when he suggested students should work at McDonald’s to cover their canceled school lunch programs.

Ted Cruz speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Feb. 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Ted Cruz’s new corruption crusade. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (R) convinced the Federal Election Commission to bless a scheme in which iHeart Media funneled revenue from his podcast into a super PAC backing his campaign — all while he chaired the committee overseeing the telecom industry. The FEC ruling further erodes the line between unregulated super PACs and campaigns. It declared that despite the super PAC owning Cruz’s podcast while boosting his campaign, it remained independent because Cruz “does not appear to have been involved” with key financial transactions. 

The scheme coincided with Cruz trying to force car buyers to subsidize AM radio. Soon after iHeart began producing Cruz’s podcast in 2022, the Texas lawmaker introduced legislation to force carmakers to include AM radio in all vehicles, whether or not their customers want it. iHeart Media — which owns hundreds of AM radio stations — has been lobbying on the bill, as have conservative groups who know that while the AM radio’s audience is shrinking, it remains a conduit for right-wing talk shows. 

The high price of Cruz’s gift. The Congressional Budget Office “estimates the total cost of the AM radio mandate would be several millions of dollars each year.” And it could be especially costly for electric vehicle buyers, who could face nearly $4 billion of pass-through costs to cover the electromagnetic mitigation needed to adapt AM radios in their rides. Cruz reintroduced the legislation last month.

Cruz keeps choosing corruption. Three years before his FEC win last week, Cruz spearheaded a successful lawsuit to let donors funnel money into politicians’ personal bank accounts. Prior to the suit, politicians after an election could use campaign donations to pay back no more than $250,000 worth of loans they made to their own campaigns. Cruz challenged that, securing a Supreme Court ruling allowing politicians to lend their campaigns unlimited money, win an election, and then have donors seeking legislative favors effectively pay back the loans at profitable interest rates that enrich the politician.

72%

The percent of Americans who say “the role of money in politics” is a very big problem in the country today — the highest percentage for any of the 24 issues asked about on the survey.” (Source: Pew Research)

🛹 Is this the most 90s thing to ever happen? Tony Hawk’s son and Kurt Cobain’s daughter got married (by R.E.M. lead singer Michael Stipe!) — and now the 90s legends share a grandchild. I’m not crying, you are.

⏳ What a time to be alive. Take a look at the two maps to remember that we are experiencing things that are unprecedented in the history of the human species.

😡 Rage rooms are the rage. Anger is on track to be a $300-million-a-year business.

“What leverage do we have against Elon Musk?” cry House Democrats while raking in cash from Musk’s lobbyists.

(AP Photo/Natalie Behring and Jose Luis Magana)

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The Trump administration has withdrawn a slate of proposed carbon dioxide safety regulations inspired by a pipeline failure that sent nearly 50 people to the hospital with “zombie”-like symptoms, and the new regulator overseeing these matters previously worked as a lobbyist for the pipeline industry. 

President Donald Trump’s moves could leave communities exposed to unprecedented dangers as oil and gas companies rush to build an extensive network of such pipelines across the country in order to secure federal tax credits and prolong the life span of fossil fuels.

The draft pipeline regulations, which were introduced by the Department of Transportation in the final week of Joe Biden’s presidency, were hard won and a long time coming. Advocates and experts have been calling for heightened safety requirements since a carbon dioxide pipeline ruptured near the village of Satartia, Mississippi, five years ago — a disaster that confounded local emergency responders, immobilized vehicles, and poisoned unsuspecting victims who report lingering respiratory, cognitive, and neurological impacts years later. 

Leaks of highly pressurized carbon dioxide can lead to confusion, unconsciousness, seizures, coma, and death within minutes, depending on the concentration and length of exposure. In Satartia, the asphyxiant gas caused dozens of people to collapse while others began to suffocate and staggered around, too dazed to seek safety, until they were rescued by first responders. 

After a multiyear investigation into the incident, regulators announced what they hoped would be “the strongest, most comprehensive standards for carbon dioxide transportation in the world,” according to then-Deputy Administrator Tristan Brown of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, the federal agency responsible for pipeline safety. 

Those plans are now up in the air after the rule disappeared from the agency’s website before it was entered into the Federal Register, which records any official changes to U.S. federal law. A Jan. 20 executive order from Trump required all federal departments and agencies to withdraw any rules that had been introduced but not yet published in the Federal Register, “so that they can be reviewed and approved” by the new department or agency head appointed by the president. 

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A new, sweeping deregulatory executive order signed by Trump on Feb. 19 now directs agency heads to identify and classify all regulations by various criteria, including ones that “impose significant costs upon private parties” and that “unjustifiably imped[e] technological innovation, infrastructure development,” and other priorities. The apparent intent is to find regulations that should be rescinded or modified.

The new acting administrator for the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, Ben Kochman, was the director of pipeline safety policy at the industry trade group Interstate Natural Gas Association of America until last month — a role that involved advocating for “effective” federal safety policy on behalf of the gas pipeline industry. 

Earlier this month, Trump nominated Paul Roberti, the agency’s chief attorney during Trump’s first term, to permanently fill the position — a move that was celebrated by industry lobbying groups, including the Liquid Energy Pipeline Association, which fought to scale back the carbon dioxide pipeline safety rule. 

Trump also selected Sean Duffy, a Fox News host and former Republican Congressman who has previously lobbied on behalf of pipeline operator Enterprise Products, as the new secretary of the Department of Transportation, where the pipeline agency is housed. 

While the new carbon dioxide pipeline safety rule is on hold, the fossil fuel industry’s plans for additional carbon capture projects — which require pipelines to transport carbon dioxide from power plants and either store it underground or, more often, use it to extract more oil — could continue to move forward. That means the continued use of existing pipelines and the potential build out of tens of thousands of miles of new ones, long before additional safety regulations are implemented. 

Safety advocates and first responders have warned that increased oversight and regulations are necessary to account for the risks these pipelines pose. But oil and gas companies say they are managing those risks on their own. As The Lever and ExxonKnews reported last year, oil companies and trade associations vigorously lobbied Congress and regulators under the Biden administration to limit the new rule’s scope, arguing it could delay the buildout of carbon capture projects. 

Last month, the pipeline safety agency claimed in a new notice that employees from Denbury, the same pipeline operator responsible for the rupture in Satartia, harassed and obstructed federal investigators who were trying to ensure the pipeline’s safety years after its catastrophic leak. Advocates say the development makes the implementation of sound federal oversight even more pressing. 

A Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration spokesperson declined to comment on the harassment, or other questions about the proposed pipeline safety rule. 

Bill Caram, executive director of the nonpartisan advocacy group Pipeline Safety Trust, warned that it’s insufficient to leave monitoring and response to pipeline failures in the hands of operators. 

“We shouldn’t have to rely on the goodwill of a company to do the right thing,” Caram said. “It should be the law to do the right thing and keep communities around [these pipelines] safe.”

“Left In A Limbo” 

Jack Willingham, director of emergency management services for Yazoo County, Mississippi, and his crew were “completely dumbfounded” when they got the first call about a green fog rolling in around the village of Satartia in February 2020. The responders acted quickly to evacuate more than 250 people — but at the time, they didn’t have the training or equipment necessary to respond to a carbon dioxide pipeline rupture. 

That’s because Denbury, a Texas-based company operating oil and gas pipelines across the Gulf Coast and Western United States and now owned by Exxon, had failed to communicate with the department about the carbon dioxide pipeline running through their area, notify them of its leak earlier that evening, or provide guidance on how to respond to or treat victims of the poisoning once the incident happened. 

An investigation of the rupture by federal pipeline regulators found that Denbury also failed to address risks that could cause an accident while building and operating the pipeline, which was used for enhanced oil recovery. That included neglecting to adequately model the potential dispersion of gas to account for the village of Satartia, operating the pipeline at a greater pressure level than necessary, and failing to prepare for the increased rainfall and landslide that ultimately weakened the pipeline’s structure. In 2023, regulators finalized a $2.9 million penalty, originally assessed at $3.9 million, on Denbury for its negligence — the second-largest fine in the agency’s history. 

“My biggest question for [Denbury] was, why did we have to contact you?” Willingham said. “The pipeline operators had a history of ‘the less they say, the better.’ And that’s where I went and said, ‘That’s not going to work.’”

The pipeline safety agency announced in 2022 that it would initiate a new rule making process to update federal safety standards for carbon dioxide pipelines, informed by input from a wide range of stakeholders including first responders like Willingham, pipeline safety advocates, concerned community members, and industry representatives. “The draft proposed rule would help address every issue that went wrong in [Satartia] and reduce risk to the public and first responders,” Brown, the former pipeline safety regulator, said via email. 

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In 2025, just days before the start of the new Trump administration, the agency issued the long-awaited proposed safety rule for carbon dioxide pipelines. The new requirements were aimed at implementing additional measures to require safer development, maintenance, monitoring, and operation of pipelines transporting carbon dioxide, along with training and equipment for first responders and communication with the public in the event of an emergency.

The draft rule included new standards for transporting gaseous and liquid carbon dioxide, which are currently unregulated; a mandate that pipeline operators perform “vapor dispersion” analyses that would help predict where the gas might travel; new leak detection system requirements; limits on contaminants in the pipelines that could cause corrosion; requirements for operators to establish emergency planning zones covering two miles on either side of the pipeline, and more. 

Notably, it did not prescribe an odorant to be added to the pipeline to warn residents of a leak — a provision that environment and public health groups had asked for, since carbon dioxide is odorless and colorless. Methane gas pipelines are required to contain odorants, giving them a signature sulfur smell that makes it easier for people to detect a leak.

Still, the proposed rule would be a significant upgrade to the existing regulatory scheme for these pipelines, safety advocates say. “Would this rule mean that all carbon dioxide pipelines will be completely safe? No, but it does a good job of modernizing the regulations,” Caram said in a statement.    

Now, with the safety rule withdrawn under the Trump-mandated regulatory freeze, advocates are concerned that communities in the path of the planned pipeline buildout — largely low-income communities and communities of color, many of whom already live near fossil fuel and petrochemical infrastructure — will be left without adequate protection. 

“The regulations have not caught up to the development that’s occurring. These pipelines are going to be put in the ground, and they’re not going to retroactively have to comply with the regulations,” said Maggie Coulter, a senior attorney at the nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute.

“We’re kind of left in a limbo,” said Carolyn Raffensperger, an Iowa-based environmental attorney and executive director of the nonprofit Science and Environmental Health Network. “If [companies] go forward with carbon dioxide pipelines that do not follow the safety standards established in that draft rule, it seems to me they are putting the public at unwarranted risk.” 

The Buildout 

The U.S. currently has roughly 5,000 miles of these carbon dioxide pipelines, which mainly run through smaller communities and deliver carbon dioxide to oil fields where it is used for enhanced oil recovery, which involves injecting carbon dioxide into oil wells to extract hard-to-recover crude oil. Much of the planned buildout is planned for Iowa, Louisiana, and other states across the Midwest and Gulf Coast. And according to a 2023 report by the Congressional Budget Office, that pipeline infrastructure could increase tenfold by 2050 under the industry’s current plans.

Spurred on by lucrative federal tax credits that pay companies per ton of carbon dioxide captured and sequestered or used for enhanced oil recovery (the latter of which could increase under a new bill introduced by Senate Republicans), industry developers have announced a bevy of new carbon capture projects. Carbon capture efforts are ostensibly designed to mitigate carbon emissions from polluting sources like power and petrochemical plants. Scientists, advocates, and even internal company documents, however, warn that these technologies will never sufficiently reduce emissions to meet global climate goals and will instead merely extend the operations of the oil and gas industry. 

Oil companies have remained steadfast in their support of federal tax credits for enhanced oil recovery — and have recently made clear that is the priority for new carbon capture developments. Some experts say Trump is well poised to expand those policies, like he did in his first administration.

Carbon capture projects require pipelines to transport the captured carbon dioxide to sites where it is injected underground. Plans by an Iowa-based carbon capture and storage firm called Summit Carbon Solutions to build a 2,100-mile pipeline traversing five states in the upper Midwest and Corn Belt could advance in the absence of updated safety rules and despite pushback from landowners, while ExxonMobil has announced several carbon capture and storage projects along the Gulf Coast. That includes one in Yazoo County, Mississippi — the same county where the Satartia disaster occurred. 

Last year, the nonprofit watchdog Oil and Gas Watch reported that carbon dioxide pipelines owned by Denbury — which operates more than 1,100 miles of carbon dioxide pipelines in the Rocky Mountains and the Gulf Coast — are more likely to leak than any other company’s pipelines. Exxon acquired Denbury in November 2023 as part of its plans to expand its carbon capture projects across the country.

Exxon says its carbon capture storage and pipelines are “well-regulated and designed to minimize risk.” The company recently expanded its pipeline safety training program to cover carbon dioxide pipelines and said first responders from Yazoo County attended a training last spring. 

Yet when Exxon’s (formerly Denbury-owned) carbon dioxide pipeline leaked in Sulphur, Louisiana last year, no pipeline operators were on site and the camera monitoring the facility was not working. Nearly two hours passed before an operator arrived on scene and fixed the leak. Many residents were not notified of the leak at all, and others — whose cars would have shut down if they tried to evacuate — were told to shelter in place. 

Caram of Pipeline Safety Trust called Exxon’s training program “a great first step” but noted it would not account for the many additional safety requirements new government regulations intended to address. 

“It’s troubling to see new [carbon capture] development before these safety regulations are developed and in effect,” he said. 

“Brazen Disregard for Safety”

Two days after the proposed carbon dioxide rule was published in January, federal regulators at the pipeline safety agency served a notice of probable violation to Denbury and Republic Testing Laboratories — the pipeline operator’s contracted welder — for allegedly preventing government inspectors from performing a routine investigation of the section of pipeline that ruptured in Satartia, which was being replaced. 

According to the notice, company employees verbally harassed, physically blocked, and refused interviews, access, and data to the inspectors during an examination of welding procedures at Republic’s La Porte, Texas, facility in 2023. 

In one case described in the notice, a Republic employee reportedly mocked inspectors who were attempting to evaluate a test specimen and made a sexist comment toward one inspector, who decided to leave the facility out of safety concerns. In another instance, Denbury and Republic allegedly physically blocked an inspector from interviewing a welder, pushing and aggressively questioning the inspector to prevent the interview.

“With this kind of behavior, the public should have little confidence in their safety,” said Ted Schettler, a public health expert and science director for the nonprofit Science and Environmental Health Network.

Exxon-owned Denbury, and Republic have 30 days to review the notice, which assessed another $2.3 million fine against the companies. The fine could be contested or retracted by the agency.

Exxon and Republic did not respond to requests for comment. 

Caram of Pipeline Safety Trust said he had “never read an enforcement action that detailed the kind of brazen disregard for safety oversight described in this notice. It shocked me.”

He added, “I hope this kind of behavior will be seen as inexcusable and worthy of punishment regardless of political winds.”

What’s Next

The fate of the proposed carbon dioxide pipeline safety rule is unclear. The Trump administration could resubmit it to the Federal Register as is, modify and resubmit it, or not resubmit it at all. 

The industry ties of the new administration’s nominees for key roles regulating pipeline safety also throw into question whether the pipeline safety agency will uphold its enforcement action and the civil penalty brought against Denbury for obstructing federal inspectors. Fossil fuel interests spent $96 million in direct donations to support Trump’s presidential campaign, according to a recent analysis. 

Kochman, the new acting head of the federal pipeline safety agency, and Roberti, Trump’s pick for its next administrator, both served in the agency during Trump’s first term. During that time, the agency proposed amendments to gas pipeline safety rules to “reduce unnecessary regulatory burden” consistent with executive orders from the president. The agency also issued a rule allowing bulk transport of potentially explosive liquefied natural gas by rail car. Despite legal challenges from environmental groups and some states, the Biden administration let the “bomb train” rule stand. 

In 2021, Kochman became director of pipeline safety policy at the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America, a lobbying group whose members include gas utilities and oil and gas pipeline companies like TC Energy and Williams Companies. Representatives from both firms were present at a March 2024 meeting on the proposed carbon dioxide pipeline safety rule. During Kochman’s tenure, the group sued regulators over gas pipeline safety standards that the agency had adopted over industry objections. 

Today, the House Transportation and Infrastructure committee will hold a meeting to discuss “Promoting and Improving Safety and Efficient Pipeline Infrastructure” — likely a precursor to introducing another bill to reauthorize the federal pipeline safety agency, or determine its lawmaking mandates and funding, advocates said. The last bill put forth by that committee received wide support from industry representatives.

Brown, the recently-departed head of the agency, said he is proud of the work his team did on “developing the most comprehensive rule of its kind.” 

“Ultimately, regardless of one’s stance on carbon dioxide transport or [carbon capture], there’s a consensus that stronger rules for carbon dioxide pipelines will help improve safety and benefit the public,” he said. 

While the safety rule was under development, environmental and public health advocates and some Democratic members of Congress called on Biden to issue a moratorium on federal permitting of all new carbon dioxide pipelines. Though a national moratorium never materialized, several states did adopt temporary prohibitions on new carbon dioxide pipeline approvals. Last July, Illinois enacted a moratorium that ends after two years or when the pipeline safety agency establishes new rules, whichever comes first. California imposed a carbon dioxide pipeline moratorium in 2022 that remains in place until the rulemaking is completed. 

“States like California are aware of the proposed rule that we announced and its provisions and are continuing to do work at the state level to help advance pipeline safety,” Brown, formerly of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, said. State governments have some permitting authority for carbon dioxide pipelines, so they could factor in additional considerations or issue moratoriums until the pipeline safety agency completes its work, Brown added. 

Jane Patton, a Louisiana-based campaign manager for the fossil economy program at the Center for International Environmental Law, argued there is no way to operate carbon dioxide pipelines in a truly safe manner. 

“That rule was the bare minimum of what should have been in place for these pipelines,” said Patton. “At the end of the day, we should have no level of permissiveness, or permitting, or allowance, for these completely unnecessary and unsafe pipelines, period.”   

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