Ex-EPA head Scott Pruitt to run for US Senate in Oklahoma

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Republican Scott Pruitt, the scandal-ridden former head of the Environmental Safety Company, filed Friday to run for Oklahoma’s open U.S. Senate seat, making a return to politics in a state with deep ties to the oil and fuel business.

Pruitt, 53, a former Oklahoma lawyer basic and outspoken supporter of the vitality business, is looking for the seat being vacated by longtime Republican Sen. Jim Inhofe.

Whereas Pruitt was lawyer basic, he filed greater than a dozen lawsuits towards the company he was later picked to steer by former President Donald Trump. After arriving in Washington, he labored to dismantle Obama-era environmental laws that aimed to scale back poisonous air pollution and planet-warming carbon emissions.

Pruitt stepped down as EPA administrator in 2018 amid a wave of ethics scandals, together with dwelling in a bargain-priced Capitol Hill rental tied to an vitality lobbyist. He additionally confronted ethics investigations into dear journeys with first-class airline seats and strange safety spending, together with a $43,000 soundproof sales space for making non-public telephone calls. He additionally demanded 24-hour-a-day safety from armed officers, leading to a swollen 20-member safety element that blew by time beyond regulation budgets and racked up bills of greater than $3 million.

Like Trump, Pruitt was a staunch advocate for the continued use of coal and different fossil fuels, voiced skepticism about mainstream local weather science and was a fierce critic of the Paris local weather settlement. Trump cheered Pruitt’s strikes to spice up fossil gas manufacturing and roll again laws opposed by company pursuits. After leaving the company, Pruitt registered as an vitality lobbyist in Indiana.

In a short interview with The Related Press on Friday, Pruitt mentioned he “led with conviction in Washington, D.C.” and chalked up the criticism towards him as ensuing from main an company that was the “Holy Grail of the American left.”

“And I made a distinction within the face of that,” Pruitt mentioned. “I believe Oklahomans know when the New York Occasions and CNN and MSNBC and people locations are towards you, Oklahomans are for you.”

Pruitt will face a crowded GOP main subject looking for to interchange Inhofe, 87, who shook up Oklahoma politics together with his announcement that he would step down in January, simply two years into his six-year time period. Ten Republican hopefuls have filed to run for the seat, together with U.S. Rep. Markwayne Mullin, former Oklahoma Home Speaker T.W. Shannon, Inhofe’s longtime chief of workers Luke Holland, state Sen. Nathan Dahm and Alex Grey, former chief of workers of the Nationwide Safety Council underneath Trump.

Former U.S. Rep. Kendra Horn was the one Democrat to file for the seat by early afternoon on Friday, the ultimate day of the three-day candidate submitting interval.

Due to Inhofe’s announcement, each of Oklahoma’s Senate seats are up for grabs this cycle. Sen. James Lankford is looking for one other six-year time period. Lankford will face Tulsa pastor Jackson Lahmeyer and Joan Farr within the GOP main. 5 Democrats, a Libertarian and an unbiased additionally filed this week to hunt that seat.

Probably the most aggressive Home race is predicted to be for the open 2nd Congressional seat in japanese Oklahoma being vacated by Mullin. Not less than 13 candidates, 12 Republicans and an unbiased, have filed for that submit.

All the statewide elected places of work are up for grabs this cycle, together with governor and lieutenant governor, in addition to 24 of the 48 state Senate seats and all 101 state Home seats.

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