Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush called President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency one of the “very best” of all of Trump’s cabinet nominees.
Democrats should put aside partisan differences and approve the nomination of Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, Bush wrote in an editorial Tuesday for CNN, referring to lawmakers who have used the nominee to generate angst among environmentalists.
One Democratic operative even told his Twitter followers shortly after the announcement that “Scott Pruitt at EPA is an existential threat to the planet.”
Democrats should pipe down and let the estimable Pruitt take the reins, according to Bush, who was the subject of constant jabs during the presidential primary at the hands of Trump.
“The EPA has become a one-agency job killer, putting working people out of a job and increasing costs for everyone,” he wrote, adding that Pruitt is “someone who understands how to rein in an out-of-control bureaucracy and ensure that Washington focuses solely on its core functions.”
The failed presidential candidate also defended Pruitt’s position on climate change.
“The far left has tried to distort Pruitt’s views in a lame attempt to make him into an anti-science boogeyman,” Bush noted, adding that, “[u]nlike liberals who want to shut down any rational debate about climate change, Pruitt has acknowledged human impact on the climate and supports a robust discussion about its effects and what the government should and shouldn’t do to address it.”
Bush’s praise for Trump’s nominees comes in stark contrast to what the Florida governor was saying during the primary season.
Trump can talk all he wants, Bush told reporters in July after getting defeated in the primaries by the former reality TV star, but there “isn’t going to be a wall built and Mexico’s not going to pay for it. And there’s not a ban on Muslims. None of that is — this is all like an alternative universe that he created. The reality is that’s not going to happen.”
The wall is not the only object dividing Bush and Trump. The former Republican governor, unlike the real estate tycoon turned president-elect, believes that human beings are contributing to global warming.
“We are living on a planet and we kind of dominate the planet, manmade climate change is part of this,” Bush said at a New Hampshire event during the presidential campaign.
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