User:Oceanflynn/sandbox/Michael Catanzaro

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Michael Catanzaro  serves as senior member of the United States National Economic Council (United States) of the United States, the top energy adviser to President Donald Trump. By September 2016 "veteran Capitol Hill aide Mike Catanzaro" was "helping to lead" Trump's "transition's energy team'. By March 21, 2017 Catanzaro was "one of the newest members of the National Economic Council staff".

Career
In 2004 Catanzaro "served as Deputy Policy Director and led energy and environmental policy issues for the 2004 Bush-Cheney re-election campaign".

He was named "Associate Director for Policy in the White House Council on Environmental Quality and then Associate Deputy Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency for the Bush administration, where he managed the agency's regulatory policy process."

Before 2012 he "served as Deputy Staff Director for the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, where he managed legislative and administrative aides focused on energy and environmental policy issues".

Before 2012, he "served as Senior Policy Advisor to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rep. John Boehner (R-OH), where Mr. Catanzaro advised the Speaker and other House leaders on all energy, natural resources and environment-related matters".

When? He worked as "Communications Director of the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, where he managed the committee's external communications efforts, and Director of Federal Legislative Relations for PPL Corporation".

Since November 2012 Catanzaro worked as "Managing Director of Strategic Communications Practice's Global Energy & Natural Resources at FTI Consulting, Inc."

Lobbyist
He was described as "formerly a registered lobbyist working for both Boeing and Halliburton."

Until late 2016, Catanzaro was working as a lobbyist representing major energy industry companies like Oklahoma-based Devon Energy, an oil and gas company, and Pennsylvania-based Talen Energy, a coal-burning electric utility. As a lobbyist Catanzaro challenged environmental regulations including the Clean Power Plan, a key element of President Obama's administration environmental plan, aimed at combating global warming. The Clean Power Plan has been under an EPA review ordered by President Trump on March 28, 2017 in Executive Order 2506328.

Trump's transition team
By September 29, 2016 Catanzaro was the "head of Trump’s energy transition team". "[A]ccording to three Republican consultants familiar with the group. Catanzaro, a partner at the lobbying firm CGCN, formerly Clark Geduldig Cranford & Nielson, has a variety of industry clients, according to federal lobbying records". On November 15, 2016 "President-elect Donald Trump has named Cleveland Heights native Michael Catanzaro to his transition team, to oversee energy independence, Politico reports. Catanzaro now works for a Washington D.C. lobbying group, CGCN Group. The group advocates for a wide range of clients, including several energy companies, such as Halliburton, Devon Energy and Encana Oil and Gas, according to the Washington Post. Catanzaro's resume includes a position on the George W. Bush re-election campaign as an energy adviser, according to his CGCN biography. He's also served as adviser to former Ohio Rep. John Boehner on energy issues. He worked for the Environmental Protection Agency as well."

"At least three lobbyists have left President-elect Donald Trump's presidential transition operation after the team imposed a new ethics policy that would have required them to drop all their clients. CGCN's Michael Catanzaro, who was responsible for energy independence; Michael Torrey, who was running the handoff at the Department of Agriculture; and Michael McKenna of MWR Strategies, who was focused on the Energy Department, are no longer part of the transition, POLITICO has learned." In November 2016 Trump "swept several registered lobbyists out of his transition team last week — only to replace them on Monday with new officials heavily involved with lobbying for the same industry interests...Michael Catanzaro, who was set to oversee the transition at the Department of Energy, is a registered lobbyist for fossil fuel giant Koch Industries. Catanzaro’s departure on Friday made way for Thomas Pyle as his replacement. Pyle is currently the president of the Institute for Energy Research, a think tank founded directly by Charles Koch, the chief executive of Koch Industries, and also funded by Koch-backed nonprofits"

Trump's Presidency
The Wall Street Journal reported in February 2017 that President Trump was likely to choose Catanzaro as one of "two veteran lobbyists to advise on energy and environmental issues in the White House".

Senior energy policy adviser
By March 6, Catanzaro was working as a "senior staff to Gary Cohn, the former Goldman Sachs executive turned National Economic Council Director." Catanzaro was one of three former lobbyists Trump had hired "to work in the highest echelons of the White House despite his campaign pledge to "drain the swamp" of Washington DC. In January, the President issued an executive order to ban the White House appointment of lobbyists to work in the same policy area in which they specialised within the corporate world."

On March 16, 2017 "Executives from Valero Energy Corp, Delta Airlines' refiner Monroe Energy, CVR Energy Inc. and several others met with Michael Catanzaro, Trump's senior energy policy aide, on March 16", 2017 to "push for biofuels overhaul".

In April 2017 "The Times scrutinized financial disclosures of top White House staffers and found that the lobbyists and consultants in their ranks had more than 300 recent corporate clients and employers, including Apple and Anthem, the insurance company. One striking case involves Michael Catanzaro, an appointee on the National Economic Council whose portfolio includes energy and environmental issues. Catanzaro was formerly a lobbyist for oil and coal companies that strenuously opposed the Obama administration’s clean power regulation. Three industry sources told the Times that Catanzaro is now working on that same issue in the Trump administration. Even under Trump’s weakened ethics rules, former lobbyists like Catanzaro are not supposed to work on issues that they formerly had lobbied on. Still, under Trump’s executive order, he can issue waivers at any time to staffers, Catanzaro included, for any reason, and never disclose it."

An April 15, 2017 report by The New York Times, in collaboration with ProPublica, raised concerns that the "Trump administration might be working around ethics violations". "[A]n analysis of lobbying documents and interviews with current and former ethics officials found" [that the appointment of Michael Catanzaro] "may have violated the Trump administration's own ethics rules". "However, figuring out if there were ethics violations is near impossible because the administration is secretly issuing waivers to the rules. One of the cases mentioned in the report relates to Michael Catanzaro, who serves as the top White House energy adviser."