Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency struggled to answer straightforward questions about science.
At his confirmation hearing on Thursday, former Rep. Lee Zeldin faced scrutiny of his limited environmental experience. For one senator, Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse, this took the form of a science pop quiz—asking, in his words, “really basic no-tricks questions about climate change.”
Whitehouse started off with a softball: “First, as a matter of law, is carbon dioxide a pollutant?”