A media watchdog group filed suit on Tuesday to force U.S. President Donald Trump's pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency to release records detailing his communications with energy companies ahead of a Senate vote to confirm his nomination.
The lawsuit was filed in Oklahoma court by the Center for Media and Democracy and accuses Scott Pruitt, who is Oklahoma's attorney general as well as Trump's nominee to become the top U.S. environmental regulator, of violating the state's Open Records Act by failing to release those emails to the public.
It also seeks to force him to respond to nine open-records requests dating to January 2015 to publish emails between his office and energy companies. Pruitt's office has received more than four dozen similar requests from other groups.