On January 29, 2025, Lee Zeldin was sworn in as the 17th Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Administrator Zeldin will work closely with the career officials at the agency to fulfill the agency’s mission to protect human health and the environment.
“It is my honor to serve as the 17th Environmental Protection Agency Administrator. Under President Trump’s leadership, we will take great strides to defend every American’s access to clean air, clean water, and clean land. We will maintain and expand the gold standard of environmental stewardship and conservation that President Trump set forth in his first administration while also prioritizing economic prosperity. I look forward to working with the agency’s talented staff and scientists to deliver results for the American people. It’s time to get to work,” said EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin.
Administrator Zeldin has dedicated his life to public service. He is currently in his 22nd year in the United States military, having deployed to Iraq in 2006 with the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division and continues to serve as a Lieutenant Colonel in the Army Reserve. He served in the New York State Senate from 2011-2014 and later represented New York’s 1st Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives from 2015-2023.
During his eight years in Congress, Zeldin worked across party lines to preserve the Long Island Sound and Plum Island. He supported key legislation that became historic, bipartisan success stories like the Great American Outdoors Act and Save our Seas Act to clean up plastics from our oceans. He also led the fight for Sea Grant, combated per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in drinking water, voted for the Lautenberg Chemical Safety Act, and supported clean energy projects on Long Island.
At just 23, Lee became the youngest attorney in New York State at the time.
Born and raised in Suffolk County, New York, Lee and his wife Diana are proud parents to their twin daughters, Mikayla and Arianna.
There were a variety of reactions to Zeldin’s confirmation.
American Petroleum Institute (API) President and CEO Mike Sommers issued the following statement:
“Administrator Lee Zeldin has a proven track record of finding solutions to the nation’s most pressing energy challenges. We look forward to working with him to advance American energy leadership, from developing smart, effective regulations to ensuring consumers—not the government—can choose the vehicles they drive.”
NATSO, SIGMA Congratulated Lee Zeldin on Confirmation:
“NATSO and SIGMA and their respective Boards of Directors congratulate Mr. Lee Zeldin on his confirmation as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). We are eager to work with Mr. Zeldin to address environmental and fuel-related policies of vital consequence to America’s transportation energy marketplace and American consumers.
“Fuel retailers support a market-driven, technology-neutral approach to fuel policy, which promotes stable fuel supplies at the lowest possible cost for consumers. Through a nationwide network of refueling locations, our industry provides a range of fuels, including existing liquid fuels, while also investing in emerging fuel technologies.
“Well-crafted policies have the power to catalyze the private investment necessary to deepen the nation’s refueling options. We appreciate Mr. Zeldin’s public commitment to implementing the Renewable Fuel Standard during his Senate confirmation hearing.
“We urge Mr. Zeldin to carefully consider the important role that programs like the Renewable Fuel Standard play in strengthening the nation’s fuel supply. The right policy framework, including the $1 per gallon biodiesel blenders’ tax credit and the year-round sale of gasoline containing 15 percent ethanol, enhance supply and reduce volatility in the marketplace, while offering consumer choice. We further encourage Mr. Zeldin to ensure that policies consider the need to bridge the gap between existing and emerging fuels as the marketplace evolves.
“As the Administration seeks to strengthen the U.S. energy market, we look forward to working with Mr. Zeldin to ensure that we can build a transportation energy market that is competitive, transparent, and serves the needs of American consumers.”
The American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) CEO Brian Jennings issued the following statement:
“We congratulate Lee Zeldin on his confirmation to lead EPA and look forward to working with him to keep the Renewable Fuel Standard on track, including safeguarding against the misuse of Small Refinery Exemptions and promptly moving forward on biofuel blending obligations for 2026 and beyond. Other priorities we will be raising with Administrator Zeldin include providing consumers with choices to use higher blends of ethanol in flexible fuel vehicles, supporting efforts to ensure nationwide year-round availability of E15, and applying the most recent GREET model to determine the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions for corn ethanol.”
RFA Congratulated Lee Zeldin on Confirmation as EPA Administrator:
“We congratulate Lee Zeldin on his confirmation today and look forward to working together to implement President Trump’s vision for unleashing American energy, bolstering economic security, creating jobs, and supporting our nation’s farmers. As noted during his Senate confirmation hearing, Mr. Zeldin understands that ethanol and other renewable fuels will play an important role in accomplishing the President’s energy and environmental objectives.
“We are confident he will support timely and transparent implementation of the Renewable Fuel Standard, take steps to facilitate expansion of lower-cost fuel blends like E15, and revisit extreme regulations that force automakers to produce costly electric vehicles that are heavily dependent on foreign raw materials. We are eager to collaborate with Administrator Zeldin and his entire team at EPA to empower greater use of more affordable, cleaner-burning, domestically produced liquid fuels.”
American Trucking Associations issued the following statement:
“The trucking industry congratulates Administrator Zeldin on his confirmation, and we look forward to the restoration of common sense in our nation’s environmental policies under his leadership of EPA.
“Over the past several years, the mad dash to zero and a patchwork of unachievable mandates on unrealistic timelines have posed a grave threat to the trucking industry, the supply chain, and our economy. The enormous price tag of this haphazard transition would have significantly raised costs for American consumers without delivering the promised environmental benefits. This was deeply regrettable, because our industry and EPA had worked together for decades to promote major advances in engines and emissions control systems that are 99% cleaner. As a result, 60 trucks today emit the same amount as one truck manufactured in 1988.
NRDC President Manish Bapna issued the following statement:
“We count on the EPA to protect clean air and water and public health and that’s what we’ll hold the next administrator accountable to do. Current EPA standards and federal incentives are already revitalizing the auto industry in precisely the way the industry sees its own future, with more than 160 electric vehicle projects totaling $82 billion in investment announced in just the past two years.
“Repealing these policies, as Trump has said he’ll do, would devastate the industry in a moment of critical transition, threatening jobs, increasing tailpipe pollution that’s wrecking the climate and driving up consumer costs.
“Similarly, we can meet demand for data centers without scrapping EPA rules to clean up dirty power plants and cut climate pollution.
“We need EPA leadership that will protect the environment and public health. That’s a big enough job without looking outside the agency’s charge.”
Sierra Club Executive Director Ben Jealous released the following statement:
“Naming an unqualified, anti-American worker nominee who opposes efforts to safeguard our clean air and water lays bare Donald Trump’s intentions to, once again, sell our health, our communities, our jobs, and our future out to corporate polluters. Our lives, our livelihoods, and our collective future cannot afford Lee Zeldin – or anyone who seeks to carry out a mission antithetical to the EPA’s mission.
“2024 will assuredly surpass 2023 as the hottest year on record. Across the country, we are experiencing record droughts, heat waves, and deadly storms, wiping out entire communities in a matter of hours. Americans need and deserve someone who will put them first, not millionaires sitting in board rooms seeking to increase the profits of multi billion dollar international corporations.
“We have made too much progress to allow Donald Trump and Lee Zeldin to take us back. We will not give up the clean energy manufacturing jobs rebuilding communities. We will not accept more dangerous air and water. And we will not allow Trump, Zeldin and corporate polluters to steal our future.”
