EPA administrator Scott Pruitt “has moved to undo, delay or otherwise block more than 30 environmental rules” in his four months in office, a larger rollback in so short a time than the agency has ever seen, says the New York Times. While the Trump agenda has stumbled in many areas, all sides agree that Pruitt “is moving effectively to dismantle the regulations and international agreements that stood as a cornerstone of President Barack Obama’s legacy,” said the newspaper.
Environmental law professor Richard Lazarus of Harvard said the volume of “environmental rollbacks in this time frame is astounding … He is more organized, much more focused than the other cabinet officials, who have not really taken charge of their agencies.” The Times said that Pruitt, rather than rely on EPA scientists, “has out-sourced crucial work to a network of lawyers, lobbyists and other allies, especially Republican state attorneys-general. ‘It amounts to a corporate takeover of the agency, in its decision- and policy-making functions,'” said Robert Weissman of the watchdog group Public Citizen.
Since February, Pruitt has filed a proposal of intent to undo or weaken Obama’s climate-change regulations, a plan to repeal the Waters of the United States rule, reversed a ban on the pesticide chlorpyrifos, and delayed rules to require the oil and gas industry to curtail leaks of the greenhouse gas methane and to prevent explosions and spills at chemical plants. After the Times story was published, a federal appeals court, in a 2-1 decision, said the EPA could not delay the methane rule.) “Pruitt’s main source of counsel on industry regulations appears to be the industries he regulates,” said the Times.
“In a sign of both Mr. Pruitt’s influence in the White House and the high regard in which Mr. Trump holds him, he will take a leading role in devising the legal path to withdraw from the 194-nation Paris agreement on climate change, a job that would typically fall to lawyers at the State Department.”