The Daily Caller overstated the number of EPA regulations being planned by over 800 percent after misreading a flawed analysis that criticizes all government regulation.

On April 29, Daily Caller reporter Michael Bastasch claimed that “EPA regulations make up 49.3 percent of all the rules currently being crafted by federal agencies.” The source for the claim, the libertarian Competitive Enterprise Institute's (CEI) annual report on the cost of federal regulations, actually listed the EPA as the sixth “most active rule-producing agency,” with 179 rules in the works according to the “Regulatory Plan and the Unified Agenda of Federal Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions.” This is a mere five percent of the 3,305 federal regulations in the pipeline at the end of 2013 and a 57 percent decrease over the decade since 2004. By citing the 1,630 rules planned by six agencies that accounted for 49.3 percent of all planned federal regulations, rather than the 179 rules from the EPA, Bastasch was off by over 800 percent.

The CEI report has been criticized for providing a flawed analysis of government regulations. Titled “Ten Thousand Commandments,” it systematically ignores any benefits of regulations, which is unsurprising in the case of EPA regulations as CEI has been extensively funded by the fossil fuel industry.

The Daily Caller's mistake fits in with a misinformation campaign against the EPA at the news site.

In 2011, the Daily Caller's Matthew Boyle flipped the results of an EPA court brief, writing that the EPA was “asking for taxpayers to shoulder the burden of up to 230,000 new bureaucrats -- at a cost of $21 billion -- to attempt to implement” new climate change regulations. But the agency was actually arguing for the exact opposite, hoping to avoid a scenario in which 230,000 new workers would be needed. The publication surprisingly stood by Boyle's demonstrably false claims, even after receiving widespread ridicule that reportedly embarrassed Daily Caller employees. Executive editor David Martosko defended the article in a comment to Politico and continued to defend it in a misleading editor's post, insisting the story was “spot-on and accurate.”

Furthermore, Daily Caller has often acted as a transcription service for Sen. James Inhofe -- who has filled an entire book with claims that global warming is a “hoax” -- to repeat his baseless attacks on the EPA.

More recently, the news site attempted to enrage readers about the EPA's research on air pollution, saying that they “tested deadly pollutants on humans” without mentioning that the agency was in compliance with extremely strict regulations in order to test the pollutants.

Given the Daily Caller's history of standing by their flawed reports, will the news site correct its latest error?

UPDATE (4/30/14): The Daily Caller removed its erroneous claim that “EPA regulations make up 49.3 percent of all the rules currently being crafted by federal agencies” without issuing a correction. From the original article:

The article now states:

Currently, the federal regulatory agencies are working on 3,305 regulations. Nearly half of these regulations are from just six agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency.

The EPA has announced some of the most controversial regulations during Obama's tenure, most recently with rules aimed at redefining its authority under the Clean Water Act and carbon dioxide emissions limits for coal plants.