Earlier this year, the Environmental Protection Agency announced that they hold the full authority to decide what constitutes a "waters of the United States" and will use that power to regulate any body of water to ensure the safety of its consumption or use. Now, a congressional audit has ruled that several federal laws have been broken by the agency when it engaged "in lobbying and covert propaganda when it used various social media tools to urge the general public to support its highly controversial rule."

The controversial rule is part of the Obama administration's Clean Water Act (CWA). TruthRevolt previously described what that entails:

The EPA defines rivers, streams, ditches, wetlands, ponds, lakes, etc. as "water" or "waters." This inclusion of any waterway, natural or man-made, has already caused trouble for property owners and farmers. Last year, a Wyoming man faced EPA fines of $75,000 per day because the federal agency deemed his private pond, built by his family for their horses, a violation of the CWA. Farmers have been so concerned over the ever changing definition of waterways that they launched a Ditch the Rule campaign to bring attention to what they view as a power grab. Without a check of the EPA's ruling, even water used on lawns could be deemed a "waters of the United States" if the runoff could be determined to affect another water source.

The ruling against the EPA was a result of an investigation by the Government Accountability Office. A statement released Monday by Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK), chair of  the Committee on Environment and Public Works, encapsulates what this means:

GAO’s finding confirms what I have long suspected, that EPA will go to extreme lengths and even violate the law to promote its activist environmental agenda. EPA’s illegal attempts to manufacture public support for its Waters of the United States rule and sway Congressional opinion regarding legislation to address that rule have undermined the integrity of the rule-making process and demonstrated how baseless this unprecedented expansion of EPA regulatory authority really is.

The New York Times reports:

The E.P.A. rolled out a social media campaign on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and even on more innovative tools such as Thunderclap to counter opposition to its water rule, which imposes new restrictions on how land near certain surface waters can be used. The agency. said the rule would prevent pollution in drinking water sources. Farmers, business groups and Republicans have called the rule flagrant government overreach.

But in the E.P.A.’s counterattack, the G.A.O. says agency officials engaged in “covert propaganda” on behalf of Mr. Obama’s water policy by concealing the fact that its social messages were coming from the E.P.A. The agency essentially became lobbyists for its cause by including links that directed people to advocacy organizations.

Federal agencies are allowed to promote their own policies, but they are not allowed to engage in propaganda, which means covert activity intended to influence the American public. They also are not allowed to use federal resources to conduct so-called grass-roots lobbying — urging the American public to contact Congress to take a certain kind of action on pending legislation.

As it promoted the Waters of the United States rule, also known as the Clean Water Rule, the E.P.A. violated both of these laws.

A 26-page report accompanied the congressional announcement and is instructing the EPA to report its violations to the president and Congress.