Climate Decade in Review - Post 14: Christie Whitman Resigns from EPA

June 27, 2003 - Christie Whitman, Administrator of EPA, resigns her post in the Bush Administration.

Christine Todd Whitman, who had been Governor of New Jersey from 1994-2001, was sworn in as Administrator of EPA on January 31, 2001. Ms. Whitman had established a good environmental record, particularly for a Republican, during her governorship, and employees at EPA were relatively pleased with her selection (I know this, because I worked there at the time. I, in fact, met Ms. Whitman on a couple of occasions).

The Bush Administration originally stated that it intended to take action on reducing greenhouse gases, but only six weeks later, officially reversed this stand. It was widely believed that Ms. Whitman did not support this change in policy, and she was often caught between the anti-environmental tendencies of the administration and the environmentalists who had expected more of her based on her record in New Jersey.

Ms. Whitman was succeeded by the feckless Michael Leavitt and then later by the obsequious Stephen Johnson, neither of whom had the slightest interest in pushing back on the White House and just went along with the delay, deny, study strategy of the Bush Administration.

Ms. Whitman now heads an environmental consulting firm, the Whitman Strategy Group, that advises companies on environmental issues, including comprehensive strategic consulting on climate change.

=================
This is one in the series of "Climate Decade in Review" posts on this blog that began in January 2010. These posts present climate-change-related events that occurred during the 00's, the warmest decade in recorded history.

1 comment:

  1. Unfortunately Ms. Whitman has sullied her reputation by failing to disclose that she is being paid by the nuclear industry to promote new nuclear power plants. She has been pushing for a nuclear "renaissance" for a few years as the co-chair of the the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition, but she rarely, if ever, mentions that the Nuclear Energy Institute -- the industry's trade group -- created the coalition and is its sole funder. And, as you might expect, she never talks about the serious safety, security, waste, and financial risks of nuclear power.
    -- Elliott Negin, Union of Concerned Scientists

    ReplyDelete