On January 9, President Donald Trump nominated acting Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Andrew Wheeler to lead the agency. Wheeler took over as EPA administrator on an interim basis when Scott Pruitt resigned on July 5, 2018. The Environment and Public Works Committee of the U.S. Senate will hold a hearing on Wheeler’s nomination on January 16, 2019. The committee must approve Wheeler before the full Senate may vote on his nomination.

 

Wheeler served as deputy administrator of the EPA from April 12 to July 9, 2018. Prior to serving as deputy administrator, Wheeler had worked as a lobbyist and lawyer. His lobbying clients included the coal company Murray Energy. Before lobbying, Wheeler worked as a staffer in the U.S. Senate, including stints as general counsel for U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) and staff director for the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. Wheeler also worked in the EPA’s Pollution Prevention and Toxics office during the George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations from 1991 to 1995.