Serious concerns have been raised by the controversial appointment of Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt as the 14th administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) – an agency he has previously sued on over a dozen occasions.
The appointment of Pruitt, who’s bio page describes him as “a leading advocate against the EPA’s activist agenda”, has caused serious consternation at the agency with nearly 800 former employees signing an open letter opposing the it.
“I can’t imagine anything more reckless than putting someone in charge of the EPA who believes that climate change is a hoax,”commented Senator Chris Murphy.
“I’ve seen nothing that indicates he’ll lift a finger to fight climate change, or protect our clean air and water,” the senator said in a statement.
Murphy was not the only angry Senator. Having been railroaded into voting on the appointment before the court imposed deadline for Pruitt to hand over 3000 or so emails, Senator Tom Carper (D-Del.), top Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee, spoke on the Senate floor:
“Mr Pruitt has been nominated by a man who, as a nominee, as a president-elect, and now as president, has made clear his goals to degrade and destroy the EPA. Like many things President Trump says, we ask ourselves, ‘Did he mean it?’ Well, Mr. President, with the nomination of Mr. Pruitt, it’s clear he did.
“As Attorney General, Mr. Pruitt shut down his office’s environmental protection unit. He went on to raise millions of dollars from the fossil fuel industry and other sources to sue the EPA because of its efforts to reduce mercury emissions, methane emissions, cross-border pollution, smog, haze, and ozone just to name a few.
“Under Attorney General Pruitt’s leadership, children in Oklahoma suffer from asthma at a higher rate than children nationally.
“Of the 16 counties in Oklahoma for which the American Lung Association has data, they have all received an F grade for smog. Every single one of them. Fish advisories in the state’s lakes have more than doubled.”
California Senate president Kevin de León also lambasted the decision: “With the confirmation of the profoundly unfit Scott Pruitt – an unapologetic career mouthpiece of the fossil-fuel industry -- as head of our nation’s Environmental Protection Agency, this is a dark and ominous day for America’s commitment to clean air, clear water, children’s health, states’ rights, science-based solutions – and the national economy that depends on them.”
