One of the more insidious dimensions of the Trump presidency is that, while the seismic issues of Russia and healthcare are justifiably soaking up a ton of attention, the kakistocratic bureaucracy rolls on behind the scenes. Cue some news about the Environmental Protection Agency, which Trump gifted to Scott Pruitt, a man best known for getting involved in more than a dozen lawsuits against the agency and once forwarding on an energy company's complaint letter to the EPA on his own letterhead. Seth Meyers checked in on Pruitt and the agency he's trying to lead by dismantling. It's not pretty:

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Pruitt's fox-burning-down-the-hen-house approach to environmental protection gets a bit of press, but maybe not enough. His boss abandoned the non-binding but hugely symbolic Paris accords and grabbed the headlines, but Pruitt has been quietly working to "disable the authority of the agency charged with protecting the nation's air, water, and public health," in the words of The New York Times. He wiped climate change off the website, fired half the scientists who advise on air and water quality, rolled back protections on streams and waterways, and tried to scuttle a regulation that mandated companies report on their methane leaks. He even stripped away restrictions on a pesticide that EPA scientists say damages children's brains.

All of these measures are favored by industry executives who want to produce and pollute with impunity to maximize profits—and who also happen to make a lot of campaign donations. Take the example Meyers highlighted: Dow Chemical CEO Andrew Liveris, who serves on a key Trump administration advisory board and also just got his maybe-carcinogenic pesticide off the chopping block. Here he is standing next to Trump at an executive order signing:

Some of Trump's more grassroots supporters might back an assault on the EPA, too, if only to stick it to the Liberal Snowflakes. But it's their water, and the health of their kids, too, that are on the line. Movements fueled by caustic resentment for the other side, and not any actual ideas of their own, seem to have their pitfalls.

Jack Holmes Politics Editor Jack Holmes is the Politics Editor at Esquire, where he writes daily and edits the Politics Blog with Charles P Pierce.

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