Former WSDOT Economist Sues, Speaks Out Over Gas Price Whistleblowing Claims

Scott Smith, a former economist with the Washington State Department of Transportation, spoke out Wednesday morning about the hostility and retaliation he says he faced after refusing to keep quiet about his calculations last year showing Washington’s cap-and-trade program would increase gas prices by 45 to 50 cents per gallon. “When I was preparing the estimates, the facts were so obvious that it was a matter of sixth-grade math,” he said during a virtual news conference the day after the Citizen Action Defense Fund filed a lawsuit on his behalf.