Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt will be selected as Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, according to multiple reports.
Pruitt’s name had drawn less attention than Gov. Mary Fallin for a potential Trump appointment, but the attorney and former baseball team owner becomes the first Oklahoman offered a position in the president-elect’s cabinet.
The New York Times called the selection a signal that Trump intends to unravel President Barack Obama’s climate change policies:
Mr. Pruitt, a Republican, has been a key architect of the legal battle against Mr. Obama’s climate change policies, actions that fit with the president-elect’s comments during the campaign. Mr. Trump has criticized the established science of human-caused global warming as a hoax, vowed to “cancel” the Paris accord committing nearly every nation to taking action to fight climate change, and attacked Mr. Obama’s signature global warming policy, the Clean Power Plan, as a “war on coal.”
While Pruitt’s impending nomination will need to be approved by the U.S. Senate, Politico reported this morning that his selection could dampen the chances that Fallin is selected to lead the U.S. Department of the Interior.
Fallin has been considered a leading contender for that position.
Choosing Pruitt would make it less likely that Trump will tap Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin as Interior secretary, since they both represent the same state. Sources close to the transition also said Fallin’s star has fallen in Trump’s inner circle in recent weeks after what they described as a rocky interview at Trump Tower.
Scott Pruitt was the center of a controversial report by the New York Times in late 2014 regarding the EPA. The Times reported that Pruitt had formed a “secretive alliance” with energy firms to push back against EPA regulations, and the paper noted a memo sent by Pruitt to the agency which appeared to originate from OKC-based Devon Energy.
From the 2014 article:
“When you use a public office, pretty shamelessly, to vouch for a private party with substantial financial interest without the disclosure of the true authorship, that is a dangerous practice,” said David B. Frohnmayer, a Republican who served a decade as attorney general in Oregon. “The puppeteer behind the stage is pulling strings, and you can’t see. I don’t like that. And when it is exposed, it makes you feel used.”
For Mr. Pruitt, the benefits have been clear. Lobbyists and company officials have been notably solicitous, helping him raise his profile as president for two years of the Republican Attorneys General Association, a post he used to help start what he and allies called the Rule of Law campaign, which was intended to push back against Washington.
If Pruitt is appointed to a federal position, Oklahoma’s governor would appoint someone to fill the remainder of his term as state attorney general.
