NOAA Chief Scientist Says Move To Contradict Agency And Back Trump Was 'Political'

NOAA's top scientist said Monday that he's investigating why the agency's leadership endorsed President Trump's false tweet that Alabama was in the path of Hurricane Dorian, after Birmingham-based meteorologists from the National Weather Service publicly pushed back on it.
In an email, Craig McLean, acting chief scientist of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, called the move by the agency to back the president inappropriate, suggesting it was politically motivated.
"I am pursuing the potential violations of our NOAA Administrative Order on Scientific Integrity," McLean wrote. "My understanding is that this intervention to contradict the forecaster was not based on science but on external factors including reputation and appearance, or simply put, political."
He also said that the unsigned agency press release that came out Friday backing the president compromises NOAA's ability "to convey life-saving information necessary to avoid substantial and specific danger to public health and safety."
NOAA, which is part of the Commerce Department, issued a statement taking the NWS to task, saying, "The Birmingham National Weather Service's Sunday morning tweet spoke in absolute terms that were inconsistent with probabilities from the best forecast products available at the time."