The Biden Environmental Protection Agency gave a little-known social justice advocacy group $20 million to restore wetlands and remove lead pipes in hundreds of homes. The group has no experience doing either of those things.
The EPA awarded the grant to Democracy Green in December as part of a $1.6 billion environmental justice initiative—the Climate Justice Community Change Program—championed by former president Joe Biden and former EPA administrator Michael Regan. Democracy Green said at the time that it would be tasked with implementing the grant’s programs while another group, the Working Lands Trust, would be tasked with providing administrative support.
“The project will involve the removal of lead pipes from homes and communities, as well as investments in nature-based solutions to restore wetlands, enhance natural water filtration, reduce flooding impacts, and support biodiversity, creating a more resilient watershed and environment,” the Biden EPA said of the grant.
But Democracy Green has never conducted wetlands restoration or lead pipe removals at any scale, a Washington Free Beacon review found. One of its top accomplishments includes providing fewer than 200 families in central North Carolina with home water quality test kits and, in some cases, with water filtration pitchers. Water test kits typically cost less than $10 and water filtration pitchers usually cost about $30, while lead pipe replacement projects are generally completed by licensed plumbing companies and cost $4,700 on average.
The $20 million grant for Democracy Green raises additional questions about the Biden administration’s process for vetting grant applicants as it sought to implement massive green energy spending programs during its final weeks in office. The Free Beacon reported last week that the Tennessee-based Young, Gifted & Green received a $20 million grant under the same EPA program while its CEO simultaneously served on a White House advisory council.
Since taking office, the Trump administration led by EPA administrator Lee Zeldin has taken aim at Biden-era green grants and recently canceled 20 environmental justice grants totaling nearly $61 million. The Democracy Green grant appears ripe for a potential cancellation since it doesn’t kick in until April.
In addition to describing its advocacy work related to lead pipes Democracy Green advocates on its website for green energy expansion in North Carolina, states its opposition to a major natural gas pipeline project that would provide energy to residents in North Carolina, and notes its work petitioning for stricter rules governing chemicals in water sources.
But Democracy Green lists just seven staff members: executive director Sanja Whittington, two coordinators, and four fellows. Whittington’s daughter La’Meshia—a social justice professor and self-described “Afro-Indigenous” equity transformation agent—is the president of Democracy Green’s four-person board of directors, which also includes Whittington’s son Robert, an environmental justice associate for the North Carolina Black Alliance.
The group states that its staff is trained on “environmental justice 101, eco-advocacy, social issues at the intersection, and in-community campaign development.”
It is unclear if Democracy Green owns an office space. The group’s current address is a UPS mailbox in Fuquay-Varina, N.C., and the group has been associated with a Raleigh address belonging to a senior citizen services company and a Georgia address belonging to a private security firm.
The group’s finances also remain a mystery. Although the group says it was founded in 2018, it registered as a 501(c)(3) organization in July 2023 and its tax filings are not public. After its registration, though, the group received two donations: $200,000 from the Washington, D.C.-based Windward Fund and $150,000 from the California-based United States Energy Foundation, both of which are well-connected left-wing grantmakers.
“The grant with the EPA is going to allow Democracy Green to scale up our remediation efforts, and that is actually going in and repiping folks that have levels of lead that’s above state action,” Whittington told the Free Beacon.
“We did a full, extensive outreach—boots on the ground in the community, educating community members to know exactly what they were impacted by. We provided testing, so they really knew for a fact they had lead,” she continued. “What this grant would do for us is help us to go in and really change the outcome for folks and ensure clean water coming out of their faucet is free of lead.”
Zeldin is skeptical.
“The Biden Administration’s lack of responsible stewardship of taxpayer dollars is astonishing and repugnant,” he told the Free Beacon. “Giving $20 million to a group to retrofit lead pipes when they have no experience doing so is just another example of the lack of accountability as the previous administration shoveled boatloads of cash, billions of taxpayer dollars to cronies and groups with the thinnest of qualifications.”
“Meanwhile, hardworking Americans were left to contend with rising prices at the grocery store, the gas pump, and everywhere else,” Zeldin added. “EPA will continue it’s line-by-line review of agency spending, and we will not stop until every taxpayer dollar has been accounted for. We have instituted a zero-tolerance policy on waste and abuse.”
La’Meshia Whittington appears to have earned some level of influence at the EPA during the Biden administration. Then-administrator Regan appointed her to his Local Government Advisory Committee in January 2024, she spoke alongside Regan at a policy forum in June 2024, and she attended an event in July 2024 where Regan and former North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper (D.) unveiled a $50 million climate initiative.
In November 2024, the Whittington family endorsed then-vice president Kamala Harris for president, noting their work with the EPA during the Biden administration. The endorsement came one month before the agency selected Democracy Green for the $20 million grant.
North Carolina’s secretary of state, meanwhile, dissolved La’Meshia Whittington’s nonprofit consulting firm, Whittington & Staley Consulting Group, in November after the firm failed to file required business paperwork, according to state filings reviewed by the Free Beacon. In her work on government policy and with the EPA, La’Meshia Whittington has touted her role as the firm’s president and CEO.
“The whole thing has grift written all over it,” Steve Milloy, a senior legal fellow at the Energy & Environment Legal Institute, told the Free Beacon. “If this was a serious problem, you wouldn’t send $20 million to some nonprofit run by a mother-daughter team with no experience. I mean, was EPA going to follow up with these women? Were they going to report on lead pipes replaced? It just makes no sense.”
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