{"id":1311962,"date":"2019-06-30T19:00:57","date_gmt":"2019-07-01T01:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/?p=982576"},"modified":"2019-06-30T19:00:57","modified_gmt":"2019-07-01T01:00:57","slug":"phil-weiser-talks-opioids-trump-appointments-possible-role-in-glenwood-mine-expansion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/phil-weiser-talks-opioids-trump-appointments-possible-role-in-glenwood-mine-expansion\/","title":{"rendered":"Phil Weiser talks opioids, Trump appointments, possible role in Glenwood mine expansion"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser recently visited the Post Independent to talk about issues facing Garfield County.<\/strong>
Colorado Attorney General\u2019s office<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser visited Glenwood Springs last week, fielding questions from the Post Independent on issues ranging from the opioid epidemic to the controversial limestone quarry expansion proposal north of town.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe continue to see deadly forms of opioids like fentanyl being pushed out. We are working on the criminal side, both with partners federally and state, and we are also suing the pharmaceutical companies,\u201d Weiser explained of what his office has done with respect to the opioid epidemic.<\/p>\n

Last year, Colorado joined a lengthy number of states when it sued OxyContin manufacturer Purdue Pharma.<\/p>\n

Weiser hoped that the money the state receives \u2014 should it win the lawsuit \u2014 gets reinvested into sustainable drug treatment across the state.<\/p>\n

\u201cPurdue Pharma is ground zero of the crisis. They, as a company, acted in ways that are just flatly wrong. They told people, \u2018don\u2019t worry about this, keep taking OxyContin, it\u2019ll be fine,\u2019 and they knew it was highly addictive,\u201d Weiser alleged of the pharmaceutical company owned by the billionaire Sackler family.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey lied to people and a lot of lives have been destroyed,\u201d Weiser said. \u201cWe need to help people get their lives back on track.\u201d<\/p>\n

Weiser, who defeated 18th Judicial District Attorney George Brauchler last November for the attorney general seat, previously served in the Clinton and Obama administrations.<\/p>\n

When asked if concerned about the current Secretary of the Interior, David Bernhardt, and his connections to the law firm now lobbying for RMR Industrials in its proposed limestone quarry expansion near Glenwood Springs, Weiser declined to comment.<\/p>\n

However, the attorney general did take the opportunity to discuss some of President Trump\u2019s other appointments.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re seeing \u2026 a number of appointees, and I\u2019ll talk about [Education Secretary] Betsy DeVos, because that\u2019s one I can talk about, who are picked for a job where there is not a commitment to the core of what the agency does,\u201d Weiser said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know that Betsy DeVos believes in public education. \u2026That sort of appointment really concerns me. And, we really need people in government who believe in the mission of the work they\u2019re doing,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen that doesn\u2019t happen, in a case like Betsy DeVos, it can have really bad consequences.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recently, the law firm of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck \u2014 for which Interior Secretary Bernhardt once worked \u2014 was listed as a lobbyist<\/a> for RMR Industrials concerning, \u201cIssues related to a potential mine expansion project in Colorado.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Department of the Interior, led by Bernhardt, a Rifle native, oversees the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The Mid-Continent limestone quarry, which RMR hopes to dramatically expand, resides on BLM land just north of Glenwood Springs.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur role there is going to be primarily serving as the legal counsel to some state agencies who are involved in it,\u201d Weiser said of what role the attorney general\u2019s office would play, if any, concerning the quarry expansion.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am aware of the issue and we have a role, but it is sort of a behind-the-scenes role that we can\u2019t really talk about,\u201d Weiser said.<\/p>\n

mabennett@postindependent.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser recently visited the Post Independent to talk about issues facing Garfield County.Colorado Attorney General\u2019s office Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser visited Glenwood Springs last week, fielding questions from the Post Independent on issues ranging from the opioid epidemic to the controversial limestone quarry expansion proposal north of town. \u201cWe continue […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1311962","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-19 20:33:28","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1311962"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311962\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1311962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1311962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1311962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}