Zeldin Would Run the EPA for Polluters
Washington — Donald Trump’s pick to run the Environmental Protection Agency, former Congressman Lee Zeldin, will face the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works at his confirmation hearing. In response, David Arkush, director of Public Citizen’s Climate Program, issued the following statement:
“If allowed to become Trump’s EPA Administrator, Zeldin would turn the agency on its head and run it for the benefit of billionaire polluters at the expense of the American people.
“In Congress, Zeldin voted repeatedly against measures to protect our environment and fix the climate crisis, and Trump says he is counting on Zeldin for ‘swift deregulatory decisions.’
“Zeldin says he wants to use the EPA to ‘pursue energy dominance.’ That is code for enriching fossil-fuel billionaires at the expense of the American people. The U.S. is already the largest producer of petroleum products in history, is the world’s largest fossil gas producer, and is exporting gas at record levels. What’s left to dominate except American families—attacking their health and pocketbooks while setting their homes on fire in pursuit of ever more fossil fuel profits?
“A real commitment to ‘energy dominance’ would mean pushing forward as quickly as possible on the cheaper, cleaner, safer renewable technologies taking over the world, not further enriching billionaire dirty-energy barons at everyone else’s expense.
“The Senate should reject Trump’s shameful pro-polluter, pro-billionaire, anti-environment, anti-American-people nominees.”
Check out Public Citizen’s Tracker on Trump Appointees’ Corporate Conflicts of Interest.
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