President-elect Donald Trump said Monday he will nominate former Rep. Lee Zeldin, New York Republican, to head the Environmental Protection Agency, putting a key Trump loyalist in line for the helm of a critical regulatory agency.
Mr. Trump said he expects Mr. Zeldin to deliver “fair and swift deregulatory decisions” that unshackle businesses while also showing fealty to environmental law.
“I have known Lee Zeldin for a long time, and have watched him handle, brilliantly, some extremely difficult and complex situations,” Mr. Trump said. “I am very proud to have him in the Trump administration, where he will quickly prove to be a great contributor!”
Mr. Zeldin, on social media, said he sees his role as helping unleash the American economy. “We will restore US energy dominance, revitalize our auto industry to bring back American jobs, and make the US the global leader of AI. We will do so while protecting access to clean air and water,” he said.
Speaking with Fox News, Mr. Zeldin said that when Mr. Trump called to offer him the job, the president-elect ticked off “15 to 20” priorities.
Mr. Zeldin will have to go through Senate confirmation.
He served as a Republican in Congress before making a bid for governor of New York in 2022, coming within 7 percentage points of unseating the sitting Democratic governor in the deep-blue state.
Mr. Zeldin served in the U.S. Army and is currently a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve.
He does not bring deep environmental experience to the job and the League of Conservation Voters, a left-leaning advocacy group, says his “score” for his four terms in office was 14%. That included votes against Biden-backed climate-change initiatives.
The Sierra Club called him “unqualified and anti-American worker.”
Mr. Trump, in announcing the nomination, pointed to Mr. Zeldin’s advocacy for infrastructure and research projects and his “vocal” positions on energy and environmental policy.
Mr. Zeldin’s selection was a surprise to some in the energy and environment community, who had been circling on other names such as Andrew Wheeler, who led the EPA at the end of the first Trump administration, and David Bernhardt, who headed the Interior Department.
The EPA has a sprawling mandate over health and environmental issues, overseeing approval of chemicals, monitoring runoff and helping set vehicle fuel efficiency standards.
Environmental regulation, along with immigration enforcement, are two of the areas that saw the largest swings in priorities from the Obama administration to the first Trump administration, which has been calculated to have reversed 100 policies.
Things swung back again with the Biden administration, and are now expected to pivot again under Mr. Trump. That includes the major international climate-change accords which President Barack Obama joined, Mr. Trump repudiated and Mr. Biden rejoined.
In his first term, Mr. Trump repeatedly suggested major cuts to the EPA budget and suggested states could pick up the slack.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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