CNN is reporting that EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt directly approached Donald Trump in April and asked him to replace Attorney General Jefferson B. Sessions with Pruitt. It wasn’t a spur of the moment decision. Pruitt had the whole plan worked out: Trump would fire Sessions, then make a temporary appointment of Pruitt without Senate approval. Pruitt could then get rid of that pesky Russia investigation—along with any other scandals Trump needed to be swept under the carpet at the Department of Justice—and before Pruitt had to face the embarrassment of an actual Senate hearing, he would run back to Oklahoma, where the people would be happy to elect him Senator, or Governor, or God-Emperor of Dune.
Scott Pruitt currently has at least 14 open investigations into his actions. That includes looking into his massive 20-plus person security team, his first class flights, his chartered military jets, his plan to build a new EPA headquarters in his home town, his use of EPA workers to run his errands, his staying at the home of a fossil fuel lobbyist for so long even the lobbyist got tired of it … a complete list of all the scandals Pruitt has crammed into a single year and a half would fill a set of Funk and Wagnalls. It’s as if Pruitt got his hands on one of the shrink rays from Ant-Man and used it to make his ethics teeny-tiny, and his pockets extra large.
Naturally, when Trump heard Pruitt’s pitch to take over as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer in the midst of a set of scandals that were growing by the hour, Trump … considered it. After all, he was mad at Sessions for not breaking the law to help Trump. But enough staffers within the White House went to apoplexy at the thought of having to defend this action that Trump backed away.
It’s not clear exactly what Pruitt expected to get from the idea. Being in charge of the EPA has given him the opportunity to grift from some of the largest companies and shadiest people in the nation. Pruitt seems to have left few of those opportunities untapped. Perhaps he was going to resume the selling of indulgences. Or maybe he thought while he was clearing away that Russia thing for Trump, he might also be able to dismiss some of those investigations of that jerkwad running the EPA.
Whatever the reason for the offer, Donald Trump doesn’t appear to have taken Pruitt up on the deal. Yet.