CHARLESTON, W.Va. — West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey says Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt is fit to serve as the nation’s next administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
“He cares passionately about the rule of law and he’s been involved in the trenches in these fights against the EPA,” Morrisey told MetroNews. “I think he’d make an outstanding administrator.”
President-Elect Donald Trump nominated Pruitt Wednesday, a move the Washington Post described as “an intention to dismantle President Obama’s climate change and environmental legacy.”
Pruitt, the AG of an oil and gas state, has spent much of his time fighting the EPA, much like Morrisey.
“I’ve worked very closely with Scott Pruitt on a number of lawsuits over the last few years. He partnered up with West Virginia as we filed a lawsuit against the EPA’s illegal Clean Power Plan,” Morrisey said. “I urge our representatives to support his nomination.”
Pruitt has served as Oklahoma’s Attorney General since 2010.
Morrisey said the next EDA administrator should be sensitive to the overreach that’s occurring in West Virginia and that “Scott Pruitt certainly is.”
“I am confident the Mountain State will have a friend in Scott Pruitt, a leader who shares President-Elect Trump’s pledge to eliminate the burdensome, job-killing regulations brought on by eight years of unlawful overreach,” Morrisey said in a statement.