National Parks Account Goes On Climate Change Tweetstorm Amid Crackdown

A bison grazes in the distance, June 11, 2012 in Badlands National Park, South Dakota. The Badlands are filled with sharply-eroded buttes, pinnacles and spires blended with prairie. The park is a designated wildernes... A bison grazes in the distance, June 11, 2012 in Badlands National Park, South Dakota. The Badlands are filled with sharply-eroded buttes, pinnacles and spires blended with prairie. The park is a designated wilderness area.(AP Photo/The Christian Science Monitor,Melanie Stetson Freeman) MORE LESS
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The tweets have been deleted and an updated story can be found here.

National Parks Twitter cannot be tamed.

The Badlands National Parks on Tuesday tweeted out information specific to climate change, one day after President Trump announced that he would loosen environmental restrictions in order to boost business and hours after he signed executive orders on the Dakota Access and Keystone XL pipelines:

The South Dakota park’s is the latest National Parks Service account to share information that doesn’t line up with the Trump administration’s positions.

The NPS got itself in trouble with the administration over the weekend after it retweeted some unflattering tweets about President Trump and his Inauguration crowd size. The Washington Post reported that the Department of the Interior was ordered to stop tweeting Friday, but by Saturday the NPS had apologized for the tweets and was back online.

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer was asked about the Department of the Interior’s reported tweet ban during Tuesday’s daily press briefing.

“I read that. My understanding is because they had inappropriately violated their own social media policies, there was guidance that was put out to the department to act in compliance to act within the rules that were set forth,” he said.

The Badlands National Park tweets come on the heels of news of crackdowns at various federal agencies. The Department of Agriculture on Monday instructed over 2,000 employees in its Agricultural Research Service to cease all public communications, which included “news releases, photos, fact sheets, news feeds, and social media content.” The Trump administration also ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to temporarily suspend awarding of grands and contracts. The Huffington Post reported that agency was also ordered to strictly prohibit external communication.

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