Speaker 1: Good Friday morning.
Speaker 2: Welcome.
Speaker 1: It is Verdict with Center Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with
Speaker 1: you and we get to give you some really exciting news.
Speaker 1: You're making history, Centator, as from what I know, you
Speaker 1: are the first sitting member of Congress to ever have
Speaker 1: a syndicated radio show. So everyone listening to this podcast
Speaker 1: in a lot of markets, you're gonna be able to
Speaker 1: hear Verdict on the radio as you're driving around town
Speaker 1: on the weekend.
Speaker 3: Well, that's exactly right, and it's a big damn deal,
Speaker 3: the Verdict Podcast. Thanks to our incredible listeners, we have
Speaker 3: about a million unique listeners that listen regularly to this show.
Speaker 3: We beat CNN every single week and as of this weekend,
Speaker 3: we will be on air starting in eighty four stations
Speaker 3: all over the country on syndicated radio, playing on Saturday
Speaker 3: and Sunday. Our Friday podcast will air either Saturday or
Speaker 3: Sunday on radio. That number, I hope and expect will grow.
Speaker 3: But it's another chance to really communicate with people across
Speaker 3: this country and to bring them behind the scenes, to
Speaker 3: let them know what's going on, what's happening. And today
Speaker 3: we've got a special guest on the podcast, Ben, You
Speaker 3: and I are in Midland, Texas. Midland is an extraordinary town.
Speaker 3: Midland is the I believe, the most entrepreneurial city on
Speaker 3: the face of the planet. It is driving the shale revolution.
Speaker 3: It is driving energy production in Texas and America. And
Speaker 3: we're here with a special guest. We're here with the
Speaker 3: Administrator of the EPA, Lee Zeldon. Now, Lee is a
Speaker 3: good friend. I'm going to introduce him to you momentarily.
Speaker 3: Lee is a veteran. He spent twenty two years in
Speaker 3: active duty in the reserves. He was a member of
Speaker 3: Congress for eight years from the great state of New York.
Speaker 3: I'll tell you I actually went and campaigned with Lee
Speaker 3: when he first ran. I went to Long Island and
Speaker 3: campaigned alongside him. He is smart, he is principled, He
Speaker 3: is a fighter. Lee was almost the governor of New York.
Speaker 3: Lee should have been the governor of New York. It
Speaker 3: would have been much better for the entire state of
Speaker 3: New York if Lee had been the governor of New York.
Speaker 3: But tragically New Yorkers decided they wanted more crime and
Speaker 3: less jobs and more insanity, and so they voted to
Speaker 3: re elect Democrats, and I will say the loss to
Speaker 3: the great State of New York ended up being a
Speaker 3: win to the United States of America because if Lee
Speaker 3: were Governor of New York, he would not have been
Speaker 3: able to say yes to the job he's in now,
Speaker 3: which is administrator of the EPA. The EPA has a
Speaker 3: massive impact on our lives, on our health and safety,
Speaker 3: but also on the economy. And I'll tell you what, lee'
Speaker 3: selden is the very first administrator of the EPA in
Speaker 3: history to come to the Permian Basin, to come to
Speaker 3: the middle of Odessa. He came because I invited him
Speaker 3: to come. Lee. Welcome, Welcome to Verdict Center Cruz.
Speaker 2: It's great to be with you on the ground in Texas.
Speaker 2: You feel the freedom here. I mean he's leaving the airport,
Speaker 2: I'm thinking of all that budget surplus government being well run.
Speaker 2: A whole lot of New Yorkers have come down in Texas.
Speaker 2: They're not looking back. A whole lot of people fleeing
Speaker 2: these blue states and they're heading to these freedom loving
Speaker 2: states because they feel like their money is going to
Speaker 2: go further, They'll feel safer, they'll live life freer. Center Cruise.
Speaker 2: You've been at the tip of the spear here in Texas,
Speaker 2: and it's been an awesome day. When I end up
Speaker 2: heading back to DC, as you well know, I'm going
Speaker 2: to be heading back with some oil stains here on
Speaker 2: the boots, my own little souvenir that you provided to me,
Speaker 2: and the staffers who enjoyed the trip to the rig
Speaker 2: and speaking a whole bunch of great yep.
Speaker 1: Now, what's so cool about you inviting him down here
Speaker 1: is you guys went to an oil rig basically like
Speaker 1: in the city. You're on it, you're seeing what's actually happening,
Speaker 1: and it's shocking that no one in the EPA role
Speaker 1: that you're in has ever done this before.
Speaker 3: Well, it was fantastic. So we started the day. We
Speaker 3: went to a rig that is drilling right now and
Speaker 3: they're drilling sixty wells and it's in Midland. It's in
Speaker 3: the city, it's not too far from downtown Midland and
Speaker 3: they lt baffles around the rig so it doesn't make
Speaker 3: much sound. It's not disturbing people. And what they're doing,
Speaker 3: they're drilling down. They're going horizontal, and they're going horizontal
Speaker 3: under people's homes, under people's businesses. Now, this is a
Speaker 3: bonanza for the people in Midland. Why because in Texas, look,
Speaker 3: you own your mineral rights. You own the rights to
Speaker 3: everything from the surface all the way down to the
Speaker 3: core of planet Earth. And that means literally, as they
Speaker 3: drill a two and a half mile long horizontal well,
Speaker 3: and they're drilling sixty of these, and if they go
Speaker 3: under your home, Ben, you know what you get. You
Speaker 3: get a check every month, a royalty check. They've literally
Speaker 3: got ten thousand people. They might just be sitting in
Speaker 3: an ordinary three bedroom home with their kids playing out back,
Speaker 3: and they get every week mailbox money of money coming
Speaker 3: in because a mile or two miles down this well
Speaker 3: is producing oil and producing natural gas. And we saw
Speaker 3: at all. It was incredible and it was a lot
Speaker 3: of fun.
Speaker 2: And the check ends up coming for many decades, like
Speaker 2: forty years, and there was they said it was one
Speaker 2: thousand workers involved in this project. I mean that benefits economically,
Speaker 2: the work that they do to protect the environment. I
Speaker 2: mean the innovation that they tap into, the way that
Speaker 2: they are able to do things better for the economy
Speaker 2: and the environment that so many other countries around the
Speaker 2: rest of the world. The EPA administrator, Ben should be
Speaker 2: seeing this stuff firsthand. Every administrator. If you're gonna have
Speaker 2: a concern enough to regulate these types of industries, you
Speaker 2: should make sure that you get your facts straight, that
Speaker 2: you're talking to people on the ground, and that you're
Speaker 2: applying common sense. And I think that I'm gonna be
Speaker 2: able to do a better job going forward. And we've
Speaker 2: we've hit the ground run and we're almost done here
Speaker 2: with the first one hundred days of President Trump's administration.
Speaker 2: We have a good team around us and there's a
Speaker 2: lot to work are proud of. I feel like today's
Speaker 2: visit will only make our team stronger.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, one of the striking things ben as
Speaker 3: Leah and I were touring the rig as he was
Speaker 3: looking around and we were hearing about ten thousand Midlanders
Speaker 3: who were getting checks in the mail every month. And
Speaker 3: I got to say, it was interesting watching Lee's perspective
Speaker 3: as someone who represented New York for eight years in
Speaker 3: Congress and who ran for governor. And look, there's a
Speaker 3: significant portion of New York State that has massive natural
Speaker 3: gas resources. The Marcella Shale extends underneath Pennsylvania and New York.
Speaker 3: And in Pennsylvania, just like here in West Texas, there
Speaker 3: are people making enormous amount of moneys, ordinary families, school teachers,
Speaker 3: and cops who are getting mailbox money every month because
Speaker 3: of the resources being extracted from their property. And I
Speaker 3: got to say, I think Lee was struck that he's
Speaker 3: visited with those New Yorkers who have that natural gas
Speaker 3: under their property and yet idiot politicians in New York
Speaker 3: won't let them develop it. And it was striking watching
Speaker 3: Lee making that option.
Speaker 2: And they're desperate to tap into it. And in New
Speaker 2: York they've banned the extraction of natural gas, they won't
Speaker 2: improve new pipelines, they're banning gas look ups to new construction,
Speaker 2: they're trying to move the state residents off of gas
Speaker 2: power vehicles all together. And that list goes on. And
Speaker 2: those people who have all this resource under their property,
Speaker 2: and they see over the border in the Pennsylvania where
Speaker 2: they are tapping into it.
Speaker 3: They're striving callacts and they're.
Speaker 2: Driving Cadillacs on the New York side. They're not bad
Speaker 2: policy in New York, good policy in Texas.
Speaker 1: And I want to go back to something you mentioned earlier,
Speaker 1: and this has been a lot of the headlines that
Speaker 1: you have been in is about you uncovering just an
Speaker 1: incredible amount of waste within your agency, and you guys
Speaker 1: are really going after that. Tell us a little bit more.
Speaker 2: EPA's annual budget is about ten billion dollars. So far,
Speaker 2: I've canceled twenty two billion dollars worth of grants. And
Speaker 2: how is that possible? One might ask. Well, in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four, the amount that EPA obligated and spent was
Speaker 2: over sixty billion dollars. A lot of money came through
Speaker 2: the Inflation Reduction Act when Democrats were in charge of Congress,
Speaker 2: and a lot of that money went through EPA. They
Speaker 2: created these green slush funds and in one case, twenty
Speaker 2: billion dollars which they couldn't get out on their own
Speaker 2: fast enough. They ended up parking at an outside bank.
Speaker 2: Towards the end of the Biden administration to give through
Speaker 2: eight pass through NGOs, many of them were brand new.
Speaker 2: One is that Stacy Abrams linked ngo that received two
Speaker 2: billion even though they only received one hundred dollars in
Speaker 2: twenty twenty three, and because of self dealing.
Speaker 3: Wait, hold on a second, they went from one hundred
Speaker 3: dollars to two billion dollars.
Speaker 2: How crazy is that? And then on page seven of
Speaker 2: their grant agreement, the Biden EPA gives them ninety days
Speaker 2: to complete a training called how to develop a budget. Now,
Speaker 2: if you feel like this.
Speaker 3: You know, with two billion dollars, you don't need much
Speaker 3: of a budget. Just spend on whatever you want.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'll add another dynamic to it. On page one
Speaker 2: of the grant agreement, they have twenty one days to
Speaker 2: start spending the money. So from day zero, they have
Speaker 2: twenty one days to start spending money. They had ninety
Speaker 2: days to complete a training called how to develop a budget.
Speaker 3: Look, this is insane, and you described what you found
Speaker 3: as essentially twenty billion dollars in gold bars that were
Speaker 3: being thrown off the Titanic that the Biden administration they realized,
Speaker 3: Oh no, Trump is coming in, Let's just throw this
Speaker 3: all out the window. I mean, is that what you found.
Speaker 2: That's exactly what happened and what alerted Senate Republicans like
Speaker 2: Senator Cruz. This was something that Senator Cruz and I
Speaker 2: spoke about back in December when we met before my
Speaker 2: confirmation hearing. There was this video that came out of
Speaker 2: a Biden EPA political appointee, a Biden EPA political appointee,
Speaker 2: talking about how they were tossing gold bars off the Titanic,
Speaker 2: rushing and get billions of dollars out the door before inauguration.
Speaker 3: This was a Biden phrase that was it was.
Speaker 2: The Biden EPA political appointee.
Speaker 3: I thought that they called it that. You gotta be kidding.
Speaker 2: That, yes, And they were doing it with an eye
Speaker 2: towards getting themselves jobs at the recipient NGOs. So this
Speaker 2: was US fulfilling a commitment to figure out we'll go
Speaker 2: find the gold bars, a commitment to bring those gold
Speaker 2: bars back into the treasury on behalf of the American taxpayer.
Speaker 3: But by the way, Lee, I will say, the the
Speaker 3: last Democrat I'm aware of who was intimately involved with
Speaker 3: gold bars was was your former neighboring colleague Bob Menendez,
Speaker 3: who was sticking gold bars in his pockets and down
Speaker 3: his pants. And and I will say Bob is currently
Speaker 3: a resident of government housing.
Speaker 2: Well there are I'll talk about resident of government and
Speaker 2: feeding off the taxpayer and abusing tax dollars. This whole
Speaker 2: scheme is riddled with self dealing and conflicts of interest,
Speaker 2: unqualified recipients, and a lack of EPA oversight. Deliberately reducing
Speaker 2: EPA oversight twenty billion dollars. That's a lot of money.
Speaker 2: And when that goes through those first eight passed irentities,
Speaker 2: a lot of that money goes through more passed through entities.
Speaker 2: And we found with one program that there was money
Speaker 2: that by the time it was getting to the ultimate recipient,
Speaker 2: it was going through four middlemen. And each of these
Speaker 2: middlemen are getting their own fee for being middlemen. And
Speaker 2: now when I had one other thing, we've heard so
Speaker 2: much about that. We've heard the term climate change, we've
Speaker 2: heard the term environmental justice. And you could build support
Speaker 2: for your term by the way that you define it,
Speaker 2: the way you argue and advocate for it. For example,
Speaker 2: one might say, so if.
Speaker 3: You call it gold bars off the Titanic, that's not
Speaker 3: the best messaging.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Amen. If you say that that we need to combat
Speaker 2: environmental justice because there's a c community, there are communities
Speaker 2: that are left behind and they need help, a lot
Speaker 2: of Americans be like, Okay, they're communities that are left behind,
Speaker 2: they need help. What do we need to do? But
Speaker 2: here's the problem. In the name of environmental justice, they
Speaker 2: will give money to their left wing activist friends instead
Speaker 2: of actually remediating environmental issues. So one of the grants
Speaker 2: I canceled was a fifty million dollar grant to a
Speaker 2: group called Climate Justice Alliance. They say that climate justice
Speaker 2: runs through a free Palestine. I say, God bless that
Speaker 2: if you are gonna give, if you're gonna spend fifty
Speaker 2: million dollars in the name of environmental justice, that money
Speaker 2: should go towards actually remediating an environmental issue in the
Speaker 2: name of climate change. They're willing to spend trillions of
Speaker 2: dollars bankrupting this country, and we as Americans need to
Speaker 2: get smartest to what the left has been up.
Speaker 3: Let me say something on this, which is you're really
Speaker 3: underscoring a very important point that when core up Democrats
Speaker 3: waste billions of dollars, they're doing multiple things. One, they're
Speaker 3: paying off their buddies and engaging in political corruptions. So
Speaker 3: the two billion dollars that was given to Stacy Abrams
Speaker 3: and her group was to buy new appliances for Georgians. Now,
Speaker 3: mind you, Stacy Abrams ran for governor of Georgia. She
Speaker 3: claimed she was the original election denier. She claims she won,
Speaker 3: never mind the fact that she didn't. But the Democrats
Speaker 3: are giving her two billion dollars because it turns out
Speaker 3: if you give someone a brand new dishwasher, maybe maybe
Speaker 3: they'll vote for you next time. It's just buying votes.
Speaker 3: That's one consequence of it. But another consequence of it
Speaker 3: is that's two billion dollars that's not being spent to
Speaker 3: clean up a super fun site. That's two billion dollars
Speaker 3: that's not being spent if you have a toxic waste dump. Look,
Speaker 3: the EPA has really important missions. Every one of us
Speaker 3: wants clean air and clean water because we all breathe
Speaker 3: and we all drink water. And if you're wasting twenty
Speaker 3: two billion dollars in cronium and corruption, that's to twenty
Speaker 3: two billion dollars that are not going to clean up
Speaker 3: the environment and make our kids safer. Is that right?
Speaker 2: One hundred percent right? And we're not here saying we
Speaker 2: want to take money from a left wing activist organization
Speaker 2: and give it to a right wing activist organization. We're
Speaker 2: talking about the money belongs to the taxpayers, and if
Speaker 2: you're going to spend the money on protecting the environment,
Speaker 2: it needs to go directly towards remediating in environmental issue
Speaker 2: period I don't want to spend a dollar more than
Speaker 2: what we need. And by the way, when some people call,
Speaker 2: someone comes to me and they say I have an
Speaker 2: idea on how to save five thousand dollars, that's a
Speaker 2: lot of money to me. Let's save five thousand dollars.
Speaker 2: Let's save five million dollars. We save five billion dollars.
Speaker 2: And what's so frustrating is that there are people when
Speaker 2: you say I have an idea to save a billion dollars,
Speaker 2: the responses, well, that's only point zero zero three percent
Speaker 2: of some larger pot of money. So you know who gives, well,
Speaker 2: I give, and whether it's a B and M, we're
Speaker 2: talking about one thousand dollars, whatever it is. When you're
Speaker 2: steward of tax dollars, you need to treat it as
Speaker 2: if it's your own money. You need to treat it
Speaker 2: with even more care and concern. And unfortunately, there are
Speaker 2: too many people in government who love wasting money and
Speaker 2: they're paying it off to the friends. In this case,
Speaker 2: we're talking about former Biden and Obama appointed administration officials,
Speaker 2: former Democratic donors. These are people who they are close
Speaker 2: with because of that alliance, not because of the qualifications
Speaker 2: Stacy Abrams, and that NGO doesn't get the money because
Speaker 2: Stacy Abrams is so experienced in handling billions of dollars.
Speaker 1: You were talking about how it's pretty clear that the
Speaker 1: Democratic Party decided they were going to take the APA,
Speaker 1: radicalize it, use it for their own personal gain and
Speaker 1: their friends and their climate religion and the Great New Deal.
Speaker 1: The list goes on and on. Can we take a
Speaker 1: step back and explain to everyone listening around the country,
Speaker 1: what is the original goal of the EPA, why was
Speaker 1: it created? What is your goal? So they understand just
Speaker 1: how far off the beaten path we've gotten.
Speaker 2: The core mission of EPA is protecting human health in
Speaker 2: the environment, and what conservatives, moderates, liberals, Republicans, Democrats, independents,
Speaker 2: what Americans, almost all universally, should be agreeing on, is
Speaker 2: that we should ensure clean air, land, and water for
Speaker 2: all Americans. That's a goal that we often talk about.
Speaker 2: And protecting the environment is something that conservatives care deeply about.
Speaker 2: We believe that we can both protect the environment and
Speaker 2: grow the economy. This isn't a binary choice. But what
Speaker 2: was happening under the Biden EPA was that they were
Speaker 2: strangulating the economy, and they were passing these regulations that
Speaker 2: were costing trillions of dollars and they were designed to
Speaker 2: put entire industries out of business. And Americans spoke up
Speaker 2: last November. They say that they want a stronger economy,
Speaker 2: they want more energy, they want more jobs. And President
Speaker 2: Trump heard that loud and clear. The campaigned on a
Speaker 2: lot of this, and that's why there's a National Energy
Speaker 2: Dominance Council, there's a national energy emergency, and that's why
Speaker 2: EPA is doing its part. We announced on March twelfth,
Speaker 2: the largest deregulatory action in the history of the country.
Speaker 2: We want to fix this instantly. We're not looking to
Speaker 2: pace ourselves. I'm not saying, hey, stay tuned in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty eight. The solution is going to finally be here.
Speaker 2: Take my word for it. I'm saying right now, we
Speaker 2: are actively walking into you and com at the same
Speaker 2: time on all fronts. We're firing on all cylinders. We
Speaker 2: will fix everything. That's our commitment.
Speaker 3: You know. Historically, the EPA, I think, has been the
Speaker 3: most dangerous and destructive regulator in the entire country, and
Speaker 3: it is under radical Democrats, promulgated rules designed to destroy jobs,
Speaker 3: to destroy entire industries. And it reminds me of a
Speaker 3: joke that I have to bet I've told on the
Speaker 3: campaign trail many times, which is what's the difference between
Speaker 3: regulators and locusts. And the answer is, you can't use
Speaker 3: pesticide on the regulators. And one time, actually out here
Speaker 3: in West Texas, an old farmer leaned forward and said,
Speaker 3: want to bet. So I'll just tell you when you
Speaker 3: come in and say I'm the regulator. West Texas is
Speaker 3: a different place. But I'll tell you why. I'm so
Speaker 3: thrilled that Lee is doing this because he brings intelligence
Speaker 3: and common sense and an understanding that we can't protect
Speaker 3: the environment, keep our air and water clean. But that
Speaker 3: doesn't mean being a crazy zealot trying to shut down
Speaker 3: every job you can in America. And that's what under
Speaker 3: Obama and Biden that they did. And so I want
Speaker 3: to ask and look, and there's a consistent theme across
Speaker 3: President Trump's cabinet of a bringing back, a resurgence of
Speaker 3: common sense, bringing back a dedication to jobs, bringing back
Speaker 3: a dedication to blue collar workers. So I want to ask.
Speaker 3: One of the things we do on Verdict, we try
Speaker 3: to bring people behind the scenes. And and so you're
Speaker 3: a member of President Trump's cabinet, let me just ask you,
Speaker 3: what's it like to be in Donald Trump's cabinet? Like,
Speaker 3: bring our listeners in what does it? What does it mean?
Speaker 3: Tell tell us about the first cabinet meeting you go to.
Speaker 3: What's it like?
Speaker 2: Now? I always thought that there was pretty much two
Speaker 2: choices for a cabinet. That a president can have a
Speaker 2: cabinet where everyone gets along and maybe they're all yes men.
Speaker 2: They don't have the relationship with the president where they
Speaker 2: can push back. It's just everyone just tells the president
Speaker 2: what they want to hear. And then option two is
Speaker 2: this team of rivals approach, where maybe people don't get
Speaker 2: along with each other, there's some conflict, and from that
Speaker 2: conflict and debate, maybe you end up with a with
Speaker 2: a better cabinet, a member you know from the Abe
Speaker 2: Lincoln Team of Rivals, A great book worth reading if
Speaker 2: anyone out there hasn't read it yet, President Trump has
Speaker 2: tried something different. I really think this this is the
Speaker 2: model of how to do it. He has a cabinet
Speaker 2: where everyone gets along with each other, there's great chemistry,
Speaker 2: and we all have the relationship with President Trump where
Speaker 2: we could tell him where we disagree on any topic.
Speaker 2: We all have that relationship with him where we are
Speaker 2: able to share our candid thoughts, our candidate recommendations. And
Speaker 2: I think this cabinet stronger for it. I think that
Speaker 2: the President and this administration his country is stronger for it.
Speaker 2: Inside those cabinet meetings like we just had one last week.
Speaker 2: It was a low over three hours long. It was
Speaker 2: so positive and it was so substantive, and we're all
Speaker 2: talking about what we are working on in our own agency.
Speaker 2: In many cases, it's working with other agencies and the partnerships.
Speaker 2: I'm a member of the National Energy Dominance Council, I'm
Speaker 2: a member of the Make America Healthy Again Commission with
Speaker 2: Secretary Kennedy, and cooperation between agencies ends up allowing us
Speaker 2: to accomplish so many other goals. Like Senator Cruz has
Speaker 2: been fighting for permitting reform, well, one of the best
Speaker 2: ways to achieve permitting reform is to have agencies working
Speaker 2: on this stuff at the same time, rather than having
Speaker 2: to go through twelve months in one agency and then
Speaker 2: you go to some other agency and they're guming up
Speaker 2: the works and the person who's applying for the purpose, like, hey,
Speaker 2: why don't you just tell us that year ago, Well,
Speaker 2: we want to make sure that we are doing things
Speaker 2: efficiently in a way that we were all making the
Speaker 2: American public proud. It's a new way to be a
Speaker 2: cabin to have a cabinet. I think this is the
Speaker 2: way presidents should do it going forward.
Speaker 3: You know, I read something last week that was amazing,
Speaker 3: which is Donald Trump, in three months of his second term,
Speaker 3: has already answered more press questions at cabinet meetings than
Speaker 3: Joe Biden did in four years as president. Although it
Speaker 3: be fair Biden may have been answering questions of voices
Speaker 3: he was hearing in his head. So I don't know
Speaker 3: about that. All right, let me ask another question, which
Speaker 3: is how did you find out you were gonna be
Speaker 3: epa administrator? Tell us what it's like. So you're sitting
Speaker 3: there minding your own business, like, how did this appointment
Speaker 3: come about?
Speaker 2: So it was a call on a Sunday morning right
Speaker 2: after the election. I spoke to the President a few
Speaker 2: times during that week after the election, and the Resident
Speaker 2: was thinking through some different options. I didn't know what
Speaker 2: he was going to ask me to do. Was clear
Speaker 2: that he wanted me to come join the team. Sunday morning.
Speaker 1: Though.
Speaker 2: He calls me up and he is locked in. He
Speaker 2: is decisive, he is motivated. He had this vision of
Speaker 2: exactly what we can be accomplishing at EPA, and his
Speaker 2: motivation motivated me. I said, if you love this idea,
Speaker 2: and I mean, I am all in. I was like, actually,
Speaker 2: what I said was if you like it, I love it,
Speaker 2: and then the rest is history. And one of the
Speaker 2: cool things about contacting me on November eleventh, when you
Speaker 2: still have two and a half months before a confirmation,
Speaker 2: is that is a runway to get fully staffed up,
Speaker 2: to fully prepare for how to hit the ground running
Speaker 2: once we got there. So the President when he called
Speaker 2: me up, he had like fifteen specific ideas he wanted
Speaker 2: us to We're just talking about permitting reform. He's talking
Speaker 2: about making America the AI capital the world. He wants
Speaker 2: to bring back American auto jobs. He wants to unleash dominance,
Speaker 2: and he had a lot of specific ideas on how
Speaker 2: to do it. Now, I don't know what that conversation
Speaker 2: was like eight years earlier when he was calling his
Speaker 2: then nominee to be EPA administrator, But I will tell
Speaker 2: you when he called me up, he was deeply knowledgeable
Speaker 2: on everything that we needed to do to do a
Speaker 2: great job.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you another question. For some of you
Speaker 1: who are listening, they hear the EPA, one of the
Speaker 1: things that you're trying to do is deregulate and allow
Speaker 1: for things to flourish that can have a huge impact
Speaker 1: on every American's life. That can be at the gas pump,
Speaker 1: that can be with natural gas, their house, that can
Speaker 1: be with countless other things. Give a list of just
Speaker 1: how important the EPA is and how much it touches
Speaker 1: in average Americans life. They may not even realize.
Speaker 2: One is the EPA has tremendous power to gum up
Speaker 2: the works on a lot. I mean, if you want
Speaker 2: permitting reform before you even have to go through a
Speaker 2: legislative process, EPA could speed up a whole lot of
Speaker 2: permitting timelines by just getting out of the way. There
Speaker 2: is incredible. Now, there's a whole bunch of landmark historic
Speaker 2: laws that are on the books. Clean Air Act, Clean
Speaker 2: Water Act, Safe Drinking Water Act, CIRCLA for super Funds,
Speaker 2: Toxic Substances, Chemicals Act, Their Control Act. There's a lot
Speaker 2: of laws around the books that have EPA doing different work.
Speaker 2: It is important for us to ensure that we are
Speaker 2: not overstepping these powers. And what we can do through
Speaker 2: our deregulatory action amounts to what is the largest deregulatory
Speaker 2: environment in the history of the country. There's never been
Speaker 2: a year, there's never been a presidential administration or a
Speaker 2: year in the past where the entire federal government did
Speaker 2: more deregulation than the EPA will do in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: That's how much we could accomplish in such a short time.
Speaker 3: That's incredible. You told a story earlier today about the
Speaker 3: EPA's involvement in cleaning up the California wildfires, and it's
Speaker 3: a good example of how it impacts people's lives. Like
Speaker 3: you wouldn't necessarily think the EPA is involved in dealing
Speaker 3: with wildfires, but you guys are deeply involved.
Speaker 2: As soon as though the wildfires hit Los Angeles, over
Speaker 2: thirteen thousand properties destroyed, President Trump comes into office. He
Speaker 2: inherits it happened a few days before he got there.
Speaker 2: He signs an executive order. He says, EPA, you have
Speaker 2: thirty days to do your entire Phase one hazardous material
Speaker 2: removal before Phase two starts, which is the Army Corps
Speaker 2: of Engineers doing their debris removal.
Speaker 3: And like with the wildfires, you have people's homes that
Speaker 3: burn to the ground. There's a lot of toxic sludge.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's a mess. It's dangerous. Like fires produce
Speaker 3: bad stuff, and you guys had to figure out how
Speaker 3: to clean it up. But do it in thirty days.
Speaker 2: Yeah, First the response was that's impossible. This is going
Speaker 2: to take you until the summer at best. It's going
Speaker 2: to take a few months for sure. The lithium ion
Speaker 2: batteries were all over this particular area. We got it
Speaker 2: done in less than thirty days after ramping up to
Speaker 2: fifteen hundred workers. Proud of the effort from EPA. We
Speaker 2: do a lot like this that the our public might
Speaker 2: not know about. And that's why in just a couple
Speaker 2: of days we're heading to the Tijuana area in southern California,
Speaker 2: where a lot of Mexican ros sewage is entering for decades.
Speaker 2: We need to end it.
Speaker 1: Number one about you guys dealing with water issues and Tijuana.
Speaker 1: And I also and there's another one that a lot
Speaker 1: of Americans will remember and that was the trained derailment,
Speaker 1: and it seemed like the government was picking winners and
Speaker 1: losers with that clean up or lack thereof. You guys
Speaker 1: have also gotten involved with that because what you did
Speaker 1: in the wildfires in California is incredible. That's what every
Speaker 1: Americans should get, no matter where they live, and politics
Speaker 1: shouldn't come into it.
Speaker 2: This is something that really showed then, Junior Senator JD
Speaker 2: Vance as someone who understands leadership in a time of crisis,
Speaker 2: when disaster strikes, your instinct as a leader should be
Speaker 2: to show up at that site and to be the
Speaker 2: voice of the people. And what was wild was JD
Speaker 2: was like the only one there. I think that might
Speaker 2: be cong from Bill Johnson's district.
Speaker 3: Well, to be fair, Donald Trump came to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well and it was JA and JD, not.
Speaker 3: Joe Biden, not Pete boudhage Edge, but Donald Trump came
Speaker 3: That's right.
Speaker 2: And I remember the conversations where JD was engaging with
Speaker 2: President Trump to make sure that President Trump was there.
Speaker 2: And this was all in the initial days and weeks
Speaker 2: after disaster struck. Yes, and a lot of people were wondering, well,
Speaker 2: where is this person, where is that person, Where is
Speaker 2: this agency? Where's that agency it should be? This is
Speaker 2: the ultimate gut check and an instinct check of it.
Speaker 3: Was amazing because Biden, the Democrats, they really liked Palestinians.
Speaker 3: You would think they would have gone, oh my.
Speaker 2: Gosh, you know all right.
Speaker 3: For the record, Lezelden is officially speechless. He doesn't know
Speaker 3: what to do with that smart ass comment.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you it was a It was such a
Speaker 2: missed opportunity to lead and that EPA. Over the course
Speaker 2: of time, they ended up being two hundred and twenty third.
Speaker 2: We saw two hundred and twenty thousand tons of contaminated
Speaker 2: soil removed, We saw tens of millions of gallons of
Speaker 2: water removed. They ended up becoming a massive EPA effort
Speaker 2: that actually is still ongoing and in a way for
Speaker 2: the environmental and human impacts. There's going to be testing
Speaker 2: going on for a long time to come. And I
Speaker 2: would encourage anyone who's out there listening, who is in
Speaker 2: that community, in the in the area that maybe you
Speaker 2: used to go to East Palestine, but now you take
Speaker 2: a detour, you go somewhere else. We all need to
Speaker 2: do our part to help bring East Palestine, Ohio back
Speaker 2: and very important to the Vice President. But unfortunately, too
Speaker 2: many of these cases have shown that lack of leadership.
Speaker 3: Well, and tell us what you're doing in Tijuana, because
Speaker 3: it's an amazing here.
Speaker 2: You have an issue where for decades Mexican row sew
Speaker 2: which has been coming across the border. It's been poured
Speaker 2: into the Tijuanna River. It ends up contaminating water and air.
Speaker 2: We have Navy seals getting sick. They have to do
Speaker 2: training somewhere else. So we have decided enough is enough.
Speaker 2: We're going to Tijuana in the coming days. I can't
Speaker 2: wait to get there. We're gonna be on the US
Speaker 2: side of that border. We have a whole plan of action.
Speaker 3: I'm just just warning you when you're in the cabinet,
Speaker 3: what happens in Tijuana does not stay in Tijuana.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, sir, great advice. And especially if you drink
Speaker 2: the water, you'll be bringing that back to you, back
Speaker 2: with you to d C. So listen, it's something that
Speaker 2: we're gonna step up on and tackle and we're proud
Speaker 2: of it. E p A wants to assist. And these
Speaker 2: are Americans that we see over there California, do they
Speaker 2: vote red or blue. All your listeners know the answer
Speaker 2: to that one doesn't matter.
Speaker 3: But look, you're you're you're cleaning that crap up. Literally,
Speaker 3: I mean that that is valuable. That's what we want
Speaker 3: the e p A to be doing. That's important. Let
Speaker 3: me let me ask you so. So you and I
Speaker 3: are in Midland, Texas. We spent the day. We started
Speaker 3: by going to to a rig that was drilling an
Speaker 3: oil well. We then had a roundtable and actually when
Speaker 3: you were being confirmed and you came by my office,
Speaker 3: you and I have been good friends for over a decade,
Speaker 3: but when you were being confirmed, I said, I want
Speaker 3: to ask you to commit to come the Midland Texas
Speaker 3: and sit down with oil and gas leaders, with entrepreneurs,
Speaker 3: with people that are producing energy and hear from them.
Speaker 3: And it's amazing. You're the first EPA administrator in history
Speaker 3: to come to the middle of Odessa, which is astonishing.
Speaker 3: It's like saying an ag secretary had never been to Iowa.
Speaker 3: It's like saying a secretary of State had never been
Speaker 3: to the United Kingdom or never been to Israel. Like
Speaker 3: your job, every EPA administrator should be in the Permian
Speaker 3: base and given the importance of it and the involvement
Speaker 3: of the EPA. So, so, tell us about you met
Speaker 3: with wildcatters and business leaders, a lot of people that
Speaker 3: are good friends of mine. Give us your impression of
Speaker 3: the folks you met and and what you learned on
Speaker 3: this trip. Was it valuable salt of the earth?
Speaker 2: Job creators? You could just imagine how much sweat equity
Speaker 2: was around that table of people who have poured their lives,
Speaker 2: their heart, blood tears, creating jobs, providing energy to Texans
Speaker 2: and beyond. And these people need us to be thanking them,
Speaker 2: to be to be praising them for their good work,
Speaker 2: to be supporting them as opposed to using our power
Speaker 2: to try to make it more difficult for them. We
Speaker 2: shouldn't be trying.
Speaker 3: To so by them. By the way, these guys are
Speaker 3: all close friends and buddies of mine. I have had
Speaker 3: great joy in recent weeks and months asking them how
Speaker 3: much they're like Billy Bob Thornton. Have they ever been
Speaker 3: tied up and had a mask over their head? Have
Speaker 3: they been covered in gasoline by cartels? Our host Bill Holmes,
Speaker 3: great great great friend, land man, very successful business man.
Speaker 3: I asked him so so, By the way, if you
Speaker 3: haven't watched Landman, you should. It's the best show on television.
Speaker 3: I did play for President Trump in the Oval Office
Speaker 3: last week. The segment from land Man where Billy Bob
Speaker 3: Thornton talks to the left wing environmental lawyer about windmills.
Speaker 3: It's the best three minutes on television of our lifetime.
Speaker 3: And I will say, at least the Landman I know
Speaker 3: in Midland tell me that that they murder fewer people
Speaker 3: than they do in the show. It's still a great show.
Speaker 2: And for Billy Bob, if you're out there listening, that
Speaker 2: was some That was a free sponsorship from Senator Ted Cruz.
Speaker 2: So you're you're lucky that you have that fan playing
Speaker 2: it for President Trump in the Oval bringing a great
Speaker 2: a great show to the people. And listen, we need
Speaker 2: to get smart with energy policy. There are people promoting
Speaker 2: win as an intermittent sources if that's a substitute for
Speaker 2: baseload power. For all of you out there listening, let's
Speaker 2: let's get smart, educate, advocate the people who are around
Speaker 2: all of the good policy.
Speaker 1: It's a really fun show today. I hope you guys
Speaker 1: enjoyed it. Don't forget this is exactly why We do
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Speaker 1: for the weekend review on Saturday morning.