13. Environmental Protection Agency · Minor
Establish a political Chief of Staff for the Office of Air and Radiation
Printed page 428 13. Environmental Protection Agency
“Establish a political Chief of Staff in D.C. to manage the entire air office.”
What has happened
- Not started
There is a Chief of Staff, and the record does not make it a political one. OPM's PLUM listing of EPA's policy and supporting positions, reported by EPA and published as of 15 June 2026, records fourteen positions in the Office of Air and Radiation — the Assistant Administrator, the Principal Deputy, two Deputy Assistant Administrators, a Senior Policy Advisor and nine office and division directors — and no Chief of Staff among them. The listing covers Presidential, noncareer SES, Schedule C and career SES posts alike, and it names OAR's Chief of Staff nowhere, while it does record Chiefs of Staff in five EPA regional offices as Schedule C GS-15 appointments. So the post EPA's own page shows Juliet Farkas holding is neither reported as a political appointment nor reported at all, and the 2024 Plum Book records no Chief of Staff post in OAR either — the post is new but not shown to be political, which is what the Quote asks for.
- OPM PLUM Reporting, PLUM Data (5 U.S.C. 3330f) — EPA positions as of 15 June 2026: fourteen Office of Air and Radiation positions, no Chief of Staff; Chiefs of Staff reported as Schedule C GS-15 in Regions 3, 4, 6, 8 and 10
- EPA, About the Office of Air and Radiation — names Juliet Farkas as Chief of Staff among OAR's leadership
Research log
What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence
Research notes
- Reviewed 2026-09-06. Status unchanged. The open lead was “EPA’s political appointee listings, or the Plum Book”. The Plum Book is the wrong instrument — the 2024 edition (S. Prt. 118-27) carries data as of 16 July 2024, so it can say what was political before the window and nothing about now. The right instrument is OPM’s PLUM database under the PLUM Act, opm.gov/about-us/open-government/plum-reporting/plum-data/, which publishes agency-reported policy and supporting positions and was current to 15 June 2026 when read. For EPA it returns 179 positions across 24 components.
- Both halves of the Quote now have an answer. Is the post new? Yes: the 2024 Plum Book’s Office of Air and Radiation block lists an Assistant Administrator, a Principal Deputy, four Deputy Assistant Administrators, two advisers and five office directors, and no Chief of Staff. Is it political? Not on the record: it is absent from the current PLUM listing, which does capture Chief of Staff posts elsewhere at EPA and marks them Schedule C.
- The limit of that negative, stated because it is real: the PLUM data is as of 15 June 2026 and EPA’s OAR page was last updated 1 July 2026, so an appointment made in the intervening fortnight would not yet appear. For that fortnight the negative is not settled.
- Not marked Already true: that label means an ask was demonstrably satisfied before 2025-01-20, and the 2024 Plum Book shows the opposite — no such post existed.
- Action
- create
- Object
- political Chief of Staff for the air office
- ID
- 1102