Former New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman, who served as Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency under President George W. Bush, expressed concerns over the energy plan detailed by presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump in Bismark, North Dakota at the end of May.
“As far as his energy policy and his environmental policy, I’m opposed to almost everything he’s talking about,” said Whitman. “He’s talking about rolling back all the protections we have to ensure that we have clean air and clear water and a good quality of life.”
“He is buying into this idea that somehow the environment and economic growth cannot go hand in hand, and that is just wrong,” Whitman noted, calling Trump’s focus on reigniting the coal industry “against the times.” She further commented that there aren’t “any credible scientists who say that climate change isn’t occurring.”
“Environmental protection is a Republican issue. The first president to set aside public land was Lincoln. It was Nixon who established, with a Democratic Congress, the Environmental Protection Agency. This is in our DNA. Conservation is inherently conservative, and it should be something that we embrace,” Whitman said. “You can have economic growth and a clean and green environment. We’ve done it. It’s not a zero-sum game.”
Whitman serves as a co-chairwoman of the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition, which advocates for nuclear energy.