Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin delivered the keynote address at the Heartland Institute’s annual climate summit Wednesday, and hoo boy did he have some words for the climate freaks who have dominated political discourse for all too long in this country.
Not only have the scolds attempted to destroy energy production in this country, but the “sky is falling” crowd has also caused European leaders to kneecap their own energy efforts, which has weakened their security and forced them to rely on foreign sources. If you've been reading about the Strait of Hormuz, you'll know that they’re finding out the hard way that it's a loser of a plan.
Zeldin said thank God Trump got elected, because now the administration isn’t putting up with speculative, self-harming, and incredibly expensive policies anymore.
Now, if the election didn't go the same way, in November of 2024, I'm pretty confident that whoever would be in this position instead of me might not have been here [at the conference] this morning. I'm pretty confident that instead of grants getting canceled to the tune of tens of billions, instead the grift would be continuing.
Instead of having an EPA administrator who limits their power to the best available reading of the law, we'd be continuing that status quo of an administrator who looks at the law and says, well, if the law doesn't say I can't, well, I guess that means I can.
It would be an EPA administrator who would go to the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee and nod their head in obedience and agreement to whatever is coming out of the mouths of [Rhode Island Democrat Senator] Sheldon Whitehouse and [Vermont independent] Bernie Sanders and [loony Massachusetts Senator] Ed Markey and all of their friends.
Zeldin’s remarks start at the 3:57 mark. (Note: They appear to have suffered some technical difficulties as the video and audio cut out in a couple of spots.)
LIVE: EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin Delivers Remarks At The ICCC https://t.co/h81W63BSCa
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) April 8, 2026
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Zeldin, rumored to potentially be Trump’s choice to be attorney general after Pam Bondi’s ouster, was just getting started and made sure to call out some of the more notorious climate alarmists:
The reason why it might be so controversial [to appear at this conference], the way that our first 14 months at the helm of EPA has gone, or why it might be so controversial that I'd be here speaking to a group of Americans, like all of you, is, because we aren't just following blind obedience to whatever the dire doom and gloom prediction of the day is from, you know, John Kerry or Al Gore, AOC.
It's controversial that we won't sign up for the script that the world is imminently about to end.
He also zinged the “elites” who have dominated the conversation for all too long — and done everything in their power to shut down any contrary views:
“What happened for years and decades in this country is that the elite, the ruling class, the people who had run the agencies, the people who have decided that they are in charge of the science, the politicians, the biggest grifters, there would be a cabal that would decide exactly which model is the chosen model, which methodology is the higher methodology,” he said.
I would note that most of the coverage I’m seeing from the mainstream press is calling the conference a group of “climate deniers.”
Hint, MSM: nobody is denying that there’s a climate. Many of us wonder, however, whether the science is truly “settled” as so many say it is — while they make gobs of money off the issue — and whether the trillion-dollar solutions actually make sense (they don’t, as RedState’s Ward Clark has chronicled so often and so well).
One thing about science: it’s never settled; it’s a process, and since so many of the eco-warriors’ predictions have failed to materialize, you’d have to be an idiot not to debate some of their “unquestionable” allegations.
Bring it, Zeldin. You’re right to question the Obama-Biden-Newsom era's ludicrous war on energy, and you’re right that much of Europe is committing suicide right before our eyes. I’m sure you’d make a great attorney general — but you seem to be kicking butt and taking names in the job you already have.
Editor’s Note: Democrats have been waging war on our energy production for decades.
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