Sierra Club Statement on Lee Zeldin’s Confirmation Hearing To Be EPA Administrator

Today, the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works is holding a hearing to consider the nomination of Lee Zeldin to be administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Zeldin is a former congressman and failed gubernatorial candidate from the state of New York, and has no apparent qualifications for the role. In his final year in Congress in 2022, Zeldin earned a paltry 5% on the League of Conservation Voters scorecard, which tracks the voting records of members of congress on critical environmental issues.

In response, Sierra Club Legislative Director Melinda Pierce released the following statement:

“Today’s hearing only highlights that Lee Zeldin is the wrong person to lead the EPA at this critical time. He has failed to adequately address the very real threat climate change poses to our nation as the American people wake each day to more deadly fires, more flooding, and dangerous record temperatures stealing more of our lives and land each day. In his last role in government, then-Congressman Zeldin regularly voted for more pollution and fewer public health protections. He opposed efforts to fund the national flood insurance program—even as rising sea levels continue to threaten his own hometown—and he voted to drastically slash funding for the very agency he now claims he wants to lead.

“Lee Zeldin has called for the repeal of standards that protect clean air and clean water. Him ascending to a role that would allow him to do polluters’ bidding from within the agency tasked with administering and enforcing those protections makes him a threat to us all. We call on members of the United States Senate to oppose his confirmation and protect the lives and livelihoods of this and all future generations.”