Free Republic

Coal company Murray Energy has sued HBO and its Sunday-night host, John Oliver, for what it says was a “false and malicious broadcast” last Sunday evening. It's seeking financial damages and a court order barring rebroadcasts of the segment's “defamatory statements.” Oliver's “Last Week Tonight” coal segment criticized the Trump administration's effort to revive the industry, saying coal jobs have dropped for decades and other energy alternatives are driving the industry's decline. He ribbed Murray Energy's CEO Robert Murray, who blames regulatory efforts by the Obama administration for damaging the coal industry. He said the 77-year-old looked like a “geriatric...

Tesla’s Elon Musk struck back at Robert Murray, chief executive of Murray Energy Corp., after the latter called Tesla “a fraud” in an interview. In a tweet, Musk said the real fraud was denying “climate science” and went on to add that the subsidies Murray spoke against in his interview with CNBC were pennies on the dollar, unlike what Big Coal gets from the government. The reason Murray lashed out at Tesla, which was in an interview with CNBC, was because the company, according to him, had failed to generate a profit despite the subsidies it receives, but he went...

Murray Energy Corp., the largest privately held coal miner in the U.S., has warned that it may soon undertake one of the biggest layoffs in the sector during this time of low energy prices. In a notice sent to workers this week, Murray said it could lay off as many as 4,400 employees, or about 80% of its workforce, because of weak coal markets. The company said it anticipates “massive workforce reductions in September.” The law requires a 60-day waiting period before large layoffs occur.

A federal judge ruled Friday that a lobbyist and former Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) official can testify for a coal company in its lawsuit against the agency. The EPA had sought to block Jeff Holmstead, who led the EPA’s air pollution office under then-President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2005, from appearing as an expert witness in Murray Energy Corp.’s case. The agency argued that Holmstead’s time at the EPA is a significant conflict of interest and his testimony would amount to little more than unreliable legal conclusions. The EPA “effectively argues that, because Mr. Holmstead once worked at...

The Environmental Protection Agency is working to block a deposition for administrator Gina McCarthy as part of a coal industry lawsuit. In a Tuesday court filing, the EPA asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit to block a scheduled deposition in a case brought against the agency by coal giant Murray Energy Corp. Murray has sued the EPA over its rules agenda, arguing that the agency doesn't properly consider the job impact of its regulations before issuing them. It has petitioned to have McCarthy deposed in the case, something scheduled for later this month. The EPA has...

The first major step in what will likely be a long, drawn-out legal process will begin today, April 16. Today, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit will hear oral arguments from 16 states and a handful of energy companies. The two consolidated cases led by the state of West Virginia and the Ohio-based Murray Energy Corporation seek to prevent EPA from finalizing the already proposed Clean Power Plan (CPP). The two lawsuits contend that EPA cannot legally regulate greenhouse gas emissions from coal-fired power plants under Section 111 of the Clean Air Act since –...

One of the nation’s largest coal companies on Wednesday sued President Barack Obama’s administration seeking to block the Environmental Protection Agency’s new carbon emissions rules for power plants. The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit by Murray Energy Corp. EPA rules announced this month seek to reduce global warming by forcing a 30 percent cut in carbon dioxide emissions from 2005 levels by 2030. […] “This is clearly an illegal attempt by the Obama EPA to impose irrational and destructive cap-and-tax mandates, which Congress and the American people have consistently rejected,”...