ICYMI: With the Media and With Public Health, Wheeler Continues Pruitt's Disgraceful Legacy

A recent Washington Post opinion piece connects dots between disgraced former EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt and Andrew Wheeler’s intimidation tactics with the media.

Last Friday, after Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler’s calendar appointments and emails were obtained through Sierra Club’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, E&E reported on Wheeler’s many ethics violations. Like Pruitt’s EPA, Wheeler’s EPA responded mockingly and dismissively calling it “misleading” and “hogwash.” They responded similarly to a Huffington Post piece about Wheeler’s former lobbying firm.

Also like Pruitt, Wheeler is prioritizing the needs of big polluters, taking over 50 meetings with industry in his short time as acting administrator. He has also refused to act on toxic PFAS contamination, placed the head of the Office of Children’s Health Protection on leave, rolled back protections from mercury pollution from coal-fired power plants, put the clean car standards in reverse, and gutted the Clean Power Plan and methane safeguards.

In response, Sierra Club Resist campaign director Maura Cowley offered the following statement:

“Senate Republicans are holding Wheeler to a rock bottom standard even while he continues to work straight out of Scott Pruitt’s playbook. While Wheeler may not be sending his staff on wild goose chases for used Trump hotel mattresses and Ritz Carlton lotion, he is following Pruitt’s lead in even more dangerous ways by attacking the media and cozying up to polluting corporations.”