Despite assurances in the last 48 hours from President Donald Trump and press secretary Sarah Sanders that Scott Pruitt will stay on the job, there were nonetheless strong signs that the embattled Environmental Protection Agency administrator would soon be gone from the administration.
"Scandal after scandal after scandal day after day after day!" veteran political scientist Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute said. "I don't see how Pruitt can survive. Not because of the scandals, but because Trump hates the stories every day."
Speculation Pruitt might soon be gone followed an intense week of the press pounding about his renting a Capitol Hill residence for $50 a week from the spouse of an energy lobbyist who has regular dealings with the EPA.
Mentioned as possible successors are Matt Mead, Wyoming's two-term Republican governor, and Russell Harding, former director of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality.
Harding, now a senior fellow in environmental and regulatory policy at the conservative Mackinac Center for Public Policy, formerly held senior positions in environmental and natural resources departments in Alaska, Arizona, and Missouri.
In recent days, Pruitt has also come under fire for giving pay raises to two top aides even after the White House refused to sign off on them. On Thursday, the EPA chief had a testy exchange with Ed Henry of Fox News over the pay raises and his rent arrangements.
The issue of living in Washington low-rent or cost-free has a history of damaging public officials. In 1998, then-House Transportation Committee Chairman Bud Shuster, R-Penn., was rocked by revelations that he lived in Washington rent-free in the residence of former top aide and high-powered transportation lobbyist Ann Eppard. Shuster resigned from Congress in February 2001, shortly after the start of his 15th term.
Even as Sanders told reporters Wednesday that "the president thinks that [Pruitt] has done a good job, particularly on the deregulation front," Trump's top spokeswoman quickly added that "we take this [charges of ethics violations] seriously and we're looking into it and we'll let you know when we finish."
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.
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