EWG Calls on Senate to Delay Confirmation Vote on Trump Nominee
SAN FRANCISCO – An Oklahoma state judge today ordered Scott Pruitt, the state’s attorney general and President Trump’s nominee for EPA administrator, to release some 3,000 emails between his office and the fossil fuel industry, under a lawsuit filed by the Center for Media and Democracy. The judge gave the attorney general’s office until next Tuesday, Feb. 21, to comply with the order, lending urgency to the growing call for a postponement of the Senate’s vote on Pruitt’s confirmation, scheduled for Friday.
Senate Democrats and a number of environmental and public interest groups have called on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to hold off on bringing the Pruitt nomination to the Senate floor for a vote until the contents of those communications can be reviewed.
Here is a statement from EWG President Ken Cook:
Pushing the vote on Scott Pruitt back by a few days in order to review these documents should be an easy call for the Senate. Pruitt has been tapped to be the nation’s top cop in charge of protecting the nation’s drinking water and air from the pollution produced by these very same industries.
America has a right to know if Scott Pruitt will be working for them, or if, in effect, he will continue working for the fossil fuel industry.
