Bill Nye the “Science Guy” is taking aim at President Trump’s Cabinet picks, singling out Environmental Protection Agency Administrator (EPA) Scott Pruitt and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos as “the least qualified people on the planet” to head their agencies.
In an interview with the Guardian published on Saturday, Nye accused the Trump administration of “dismantling” the government from within, specifically pointing to White House chief strategist Steve Bannon as a driving force behind the strategy.
“There is a technique of dismantling government from within, which is the thinking of Bannon,” Nye said. “They are hiring the least qualified people on the planet to run the agencies, such as Mr. Pruitt at the EPA and Ms. DeVos at the department of education.”
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Bannon, one of Trump’s top advisers and the former executive chair of the far-right Breitbart News, has said that he wants to deconstruct the “administrative state.”
Nye’s comments came ahead of the March for Science in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, which seeks to rally support for evidence-based policy and scientific funding. Nye is a co-chair of the event.
Pruitt, who became EPA administrator in February despite fierce opposition from environmental advocates, previously served as Oklahoma’s attorney general. During his tenure in that post, he sued the EPA more than a dozen times.
Pruitt stirred controversy last month after saying on CNBC that he does not believe that carbon emissions caused by human activity are a primary contributor to climate change, despite climate scientists overwhelmingly agreeing that CO2 emissions are a key contributor to climate change.
DeVos, a major GOP donor and advocate for charter schools, has also been criticized for her appointment to lead the Education Department. Critics have argued that her lack of experience in public education leaves her unqualified to oversee the agency charged with overseeing it.