| President-elect Donald Trump blindsided the climate world Monday by choosing a personal ally with a mixed conservation record and little regulatory experience to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. Lee Zeldin, a former Republican representative from Long Island, will captain Trump’s second-term deregulatory agenda if confirmed by the Senate. Zeldin’s main credentials seem to be his loyalty to Trump: He supported the former president through both his first impeachment trial and his post-2020-election bid to remain in power. At the same time, his past acknowledgments that climate change is real and support for crackdowns on some toxic chemicals don’t entirely match Trump’s campaign rhetoric — even if Zeldin cast a lot of votes against climate and clean air and water legislation. Industry advocates and conservatives applauded the choice, saying Zeldin would carry out Trump’s plans to reshape the agency. Myron Ebell, who led Trump’s 2020 EPA transition team, said Zeldin “has the complete confidence of the President.” “He also will be a great advocate in public for what they’re trying to do,” he said. Zeldin will quarterback efforts to roll back President Joe Biden’s marquee climate rules for power, petroleum, cars and trucks. Trump said in a Monday statement that his ally would “ensure fair and swift deregulatory decisions that will be enacted in a way to unleash the power of American businesses.” Zeldin pledged on X to use his EPA perch to “restore U.S. energy dominance, revitalize our auto industry to bring back American jobs, and make the U.S. the global leader of AI.” The former representative is already getting a warm reception among Capitol Hill Republicans, Timothy Cama and Garrett Downs report today. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), the likely Senate Environment and Public Works Committee chair, called Zeldin a “strong choice” to help roll back “regulatory overreach.” Mixed messages?
The announcement surprised many who work closely with EPA and expected Trump to renominate Andrew Wheeler — his second EPA administrator and a veteran coal industry lawyer. Wheeler signaled an interest in returning to EPA earlier this year to lead the work of undoing Biden’s regulatory legacy. As Scott Waldman and I write today, Zeldin’s slim record on regulations is a sharp contrast to Wheeler’s — and even to that of Scott Pruitt, Trump’s first EPA administrator and a former Oklahoma attorney general who had spent years suing the agency before leading it. Zeldin’s record on climate and the environment is also mixed. The former representative, who served in the House between 2015 and 2023, holds a League of Conservation Voters lifetime score of only 14 percent. He targeted New York’s tough climate laws two years ago when he ran against Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul. But he was also a member of two climate-themed House caucuses — not an unusual resume item for Republicans from blue-leaning regions. During that time, Zeldin worked with New York’s LCV to fight offshore drilling, as Kevin Bogardus writes today. The former lawmaker also took an active interest in the health of the Long Island Sound and in empowering EPA to ban harmful “forever chemicals.” And he bucked his party in supporting the Department of Defense’s authority to plan for climate change. His sparse environmental record still worries Democrats who say he’s a 2020 election denier who will bow to the interests of polluting industries. “It's a signal that the attack on the regulatory state is going to move forward in a big way at EPA, and things like clean air and clean water and public health are going to be secondary if even considered at all,” said Rep. Jared Huffman of California, a top Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee.
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