Trump picks Zeldin to head EPA: What to expect from Trump new administration on climate?

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00:00Our international affairs commentator, Douglas Herbert.

00:02Doug, we got a whole range of picks that have been announced.

00:05Let's talk about which direction the administration is going to head when it comes to, say, climate

00:10change, for instance.

00:11We have the EPA head that has been announced.

00:13Yeah, this is a giant dossier, if you will.

00:16Look, Donald Trump has made no secret of the fact that he would almost like to take a wrecking

00:20ball to the Environmental Protection Agency, the EPA.

00:23There's been even talk, not confirmed, that they would move it out of Washington.

00:28He basically blames the Environmental Protection Agency for all these regulations, environmental

00:32regulations, which have thwarted or inhibited certain industries, namely construction, gas,

00:37oil industries, from being able to maximize their potential, as he would put it, bring

00:41back American jobs.

00:42So he puts it in sort of America first, job first perspective.

00:46The man who he has appointed is really in the image of this anti-environmental regulation

00:52sort of policy.

00:53He is a hardliner.

00:54He's a New Yorker like Trump from Long Island, a former congressman.

00:58He is perhaps most known for having voted against certifying the election in 2020.

01:04So joining Trump's big lie claims and also voting against Joe Biden's landmark climate

01:14initiative, the Inflation Reduction Act, which really pumped about $370 billion into cleaning

01:20up water, into clean energy, into transition towards electric vehicles.

01:25He's voted many, many times on many occasions against bills and legislation to clean the

01:30air, to clean the water.

01:32Among the planks in sort of the Project 2025, which people believe elements of which are

01:37going to be prominent in Trump's administration are, say, slashing funding for the EPA, but

01:41also targeting, you know, taking away special programs, targeting minority communities,

01:48which are often the worst hit by pollution, bad air, bad water.

01:52All of this is in Zeldin's remit.

01:55He was actually given a score of 14 by the League of Conservation Voters, 14 points out

02:00of 100.

02:01You might say pretty bad, but actually that's pretty high for a lot of the Republicans in

02:04Trump's MAGA movement.

02:06But climate does not look right now like it is going to be the high priority, even though

02:10he says that America's energy dominance will not come at the cost of the environment.

02:15He pledges that maintains the highest clean air and water standards.

02:20I'm not quite sure how he's going to reconcile those two goals.

02:22I mean, he says he wants a drill, baby, drill.

02:24So we'll see what happens on that front.

02:25Let's talk about immigration, because this, of course, was a central theme of his re-election

02:30campaign.

02:31He's named a border czar.

02:33What can we expect with that?

02:35All of these policies.

02:37The border czar, Michael Walsh, basically, actually, Tom Homan, is the immigration border

02:43czar.

02:45You also have the National Security Advisor, Michael Walsh, coming in.

02:47You have Kristi Noem, who's the South Dakota governor, who's going to be heading up homeland

02:53security, and along with all of them joining this group is Stephen Miller, who's perhaps

02:59the hardest liner of hardliners on immigration, perhaps the architect of this idea of mass

03:03deportations, or one of the driving galvanizing forces behind that policy.

03:08We recently last heard him in public at the Madison Square Garden rally on the eve of

03:13the election saying, you know, America is for Americans only.

03:17So he is a hardline far right.

03:19Some people brand him as a white supremacist, obviously a label he would reject.

03:23But altogether, they are going to be overseeing this quartet, if you will.

03:27I add Michael Walsh because he's a National Security Advisor, which includes, obviously,

03:31border security.

03:32But he and Kristi Noem at homeland security, Tom Homan in immigration, they're all going

03:37to be overseeing these crackdowns in immigration, as envisioned by the Trump administration

03:42coming in.

03:43It could mean, not could mean, probably will mean imminent workplace enforcement.

03:48What does workplace enforcement mean?

03:49It's a euphemism for raiding workplaces and essentially rounding up undocumented migrants.

03:56Targeted arrests of undocumented migrants.

03:58It's thought the Trump's policy, it's been that he would like to deport under this mass

04:04program, deportation program, up to a million undocumented immigrants a year, which is an

04:08enormous number.

04:09It would be about a tenfold increase over the current number.

04:12It's right now, perhaps financially and logistically difficult, so the policies in the beginning

04:17might be more targeted on undocumented immigrants who have committed crimes.

04:21Still a tall order, how they're going to concretely carry this out.

04:25But they have the hardliners at the head of these policy departments, especially the new

04:31border czar.

04:32He is a hardliner who's worked as the head of ICE, the acting director, the Immigration

04:37and Customs Enforcement Administration, the big agency there.

04:41So these people are basically going to be fully in lockstep.

04:45There are no dissenting voices here when it comes to immigration policy and Donald Trump's

04:48promises to crack down, as he would put it, perhaps the biggest deportations, mass deportations

04:54in the country's history.

04:56Thank you very much for that Douglas Hogarth.

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