Washington Post Writer Finally Discloses He’s a Shill for Fossil Fuel Industry

http://ecowatch.com/2015/12/22/wash-post-ed-rogers/

Andrew Seifter, Media Matters for America | December 22, 2015

In his latest column repeating his clients’ attacks on climate change policies, lobbyist and Washington Post writer Ed Rogers finally disclosed to readers that his lobbying firm “represents interests in the fossil fuel [industry].”

Rogers is the chairman of BGR Group, a top lobbying firm that has received more than $700,000 from the energy industry in 2015. Rogers has personally lobbied this year for Southern Company, one of the largest electric utility companies in the U.S.—and one of the biggest opponents of the most significant U.S. policy to combat climate change.

•••••

The Post’s past failure to require Rogers to disclose his lobbying firm’s clients—both fossil fuel and otherwise—drew criticism from media ethicists. Among them was Ed Wasserman, dean of the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California, Berkeley, who said it’s clear that “someone else is paying” Rogers to write his columns and urged the Post to provide “specific disclosure” of Rogers’ clients rather than a “blanket description of him as a lobbyist,” in order to make plain that he “has a horse to back” in his columns.

•••••