Under President Obama, the EPA has been acting as a rogue agency imposing burdensome regulations without congressional approval. One reason President-elect Trump got so many votes in swing states is that he campaigned hard on providing average Americans with relief from administrative agents who have not been held accountable for their actions. By selecting Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt to lead the EPA, Trump has followed through on one of his core campaign commitments.
As a state attorney general, Pruitt has persistently pushed back in court against the EPA’s regulatory overreach. But at the same time, Pruitt has also made it clear he sees a constructive role for the EPA at the federal level.
In Oklahoma, he vigorously pursued and prosecuted polluters. Dustin McDaniel, the former Democratic attorney general of Arkansas, submitted a letter to the Senate crediting Pruitt as a “defender of sound science and good policy as appropriate tools to protect the environment of his state.” With Pruitt, there is clearly an opportunity to re-direct the agency away from its activist agenda back to a mission focused on responsible protection of our natural resources.
Environmental activists who claim anti-emissions regulations are desperately needed to alleviate the threat of global warming are free to make their case to the public and to elected officials who must stand before the public each election cycle. But they should not be permitted to reshape public policy in the absence of a straight up and down vote in Congress. Unfortunately, that’s what has happened under Obama.
A critical turning point was reached in 2014 when staffers with the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works released a report entitled, “EPA’s Playbook Unveiled: A Story of Fraud, Deceit, and Secret Science.” The report called out and exposed EPA agents who concealed, and even manipulated, scientific data to advance their big government agenda. This agency must be brought to heel.
Under Obama, the EPA made 4,000 new regulations, a regulatory agenda driven and supported by well-funded environmental groups and activists. These regulations cost billions in compliance costs, effectively raise hidden taxes, and destroy jobs. That would certainly help explain why a 2015 Pew poll found that roughly half of Americans had an unfavorable view of the EPA.
One of the most pernicious regulations under Obama involves the new Waters of the United States rule, which gives the EPA authority to regulate “navigable waters” across the country. Obama’s EPA redefined “waterways” to include everything from drainage ditches to rainfall ponds. WOTUS has gone far beyond a goal of protecting water quality to becoming an intrusive, costly, burdensome rule on family farms, forestry and logging activities, and even commercial development such as golf courses.
Those Democratic senators, who postured as champions of average Americans during Pruitt’s confirmation hearings on Wednesday, ought to focus more time and attention on the impact EPA regulations have on the people they say they represent. The idea that Pruitt should be denied his appointment because he declines to buy into what his Senate inquisitors describe as the “scientific consensus” on global warming alarmism does not square with what updated scientific research into climate change actually shows.
There are now hundreds of scientists from across the globe who question the premise of manmade global warming theories and instead point to natural influences as the primary drivers of warming and cooling trends. The Nongovernmental Panel on Climate Change, set up as a rejoinder to the global warming reports from the United Nations, finds no scientific consensus, no basis for predictions of future climate conditions and no case for forcing a transition away from fossil fuels into unreliable renewable energy resources.
Unlike his critics, Pruitt understands that the EPA’s regulations are based on dubious scientific claims that have been used to justify a regulatory agenda at odds with the public interest. He’s an ideal pick.
Kevin Mooney is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is an investigative reporter in Washington, D.C. who writes for several national publications. Thinking of submitting an op-ed to the Washington Examiner? Be sure to read our guidelines on submissions.
