Thursday morning, President-elect Donald Trump announced his intent to nominate another evangelical Christian to a Cabinet-level post in his administration.
Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, an expert in Constitutional law who has been a thorn in the side of the Obama Administration’s Environmental Protection Agency, will now lead that organization in the Trump administration, pending Senate confirmation. Adding Pruitt will make seven evangelicals at the Cabinet table.
In appointing Pruitt, the Trump team is hoping to bring an expert in Constitutional law to what many consider a lawless federal bureaucracy. He also brings a deep understanding of the impact of regulations on both the environment and the economy.
“For too long, the Environmental Protection Agency has spent taxpayer dollars on an out-of-control anti-energy agenda that has destroyed millions of jobs while also undermining our incredible farmers and many other businesses and industries at every turn,” the president-elect said. “As my EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, the highly respected attorney general from the state of Oklahoma, will reverse this trend and restore the EPA’s essential mission of keeping our air and our water clean and safe.”
Pruitt will be deeply involved in the implementation of Trump’s national energy policy, which will move America toward energy independence and create millions of new jobs while protecting clean air and water. As the Presidential Transition Team’s press release stated: “Pruitt will ensure that we conserve our natural habitats, reserves and resources while unleashing an energy revolution that will bring vast new wealth to our country.”
“I am deeply grateful and honored to serve as President-elect Trump’s EPA administrator,” Pruitt said. “The American people are tired of seeing billions of dollars drained from our economy due to unnecessary EPA regulations, and I intend to run this agency in a way that fosters both responsible protection of the environment and freedom for American businesses.”
He said he agrees with President-elect Trump that job-destroying executive actions should be rescinded and barriers to responsible energy production should be eliminated, which will create “at least a half-million jobs each year and produce $30 billion in higher wages.”
Pruitt has been a national leader against the EPA’s job-killing war on coal. As Oklahoma’s attorney general, he established the state’s first “federalism unit” to combat unwarranted regulation and overreach by the federal government—echoing the president-elect’s sentiment that states should have the sovereignty to make many regulatory decisions for their own markets.
“My administration strongly believes in environmental protection,” Trump added. “Scott Pruitt will be a powerful advocate for that mission while promoting jobs, safety and opportunity.” {eoa}
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