pruitt. we got the news of these top staffers' resignations today, the day after news broke that scott pruitt had directed yet another senior epa staffer to ask the chik-fil-a corporation for help getting his wife a chik-fil-a franchise. by way of illustrating life at this government agency right now, i want to show you the response when reporters got news of the first top staffer quitting mr. pruitt's staff today. this is from the atlantic.com, quote, when reached by foam, johan wilcox, an epa spokesperson would not comment. he said, quote, you have a great day. you're a piece of trash. consider not just what the trump administration has done to the epa, consider what they've done to the job of covering the epa as a reporter, on the taxpayers' dime. you have a great day. you're a piece of trash. joining us now is lisa friedman. she's a climate reporter for "the new york times." ms. friedman, thank you very much for join us. i'm sorry that your job has become marginally more hostile than it h

scott pruitt running this agency. we have since learned there was an effort to buy him a $100,000 a month private jet membership to have a private jet on standby at taxpayers' expense whenever he wanted to go anywhere and he used an emergency contingency provision in the safe drinking water act meant to hire scientists in the event of a drinking water emergency, he used it instead to hire lobbyists and spokespeople and to give big raises, 30, 40, $50,000 raises to young staff members he brought with him to -- from oklahoma. we then learned that one of those staffers who he gave a $30,000 raise to, she had among her taxpayer funded responsibilities, the job of shopping for potential apartments for scott pruit in washington d.c. and as you no doubt have come to know, that has since led to revelations that at least for the first year in office, where scott pruitt lived in d.c. was in a swanky capitol hill townhouse coowned by an energy lobbyist who charged scott pruitt a princely sum of $50 a night to stay there but he o

good thing you rushed the vote on scott pruitt. pruitt does end up taking fall because of this growing scandal around him, he will be falling for a much greater height because of the way republicans rushed him into the cabinet. that does it for us tonight. see you again tomorrow. "first look" is up next. >>> shannon, shannon, shannon glenn, this is not a tv program. shannon, you don't just get to yell out. we are going to have you sit down like big boys and girls. >> glenn, glenn, who here hates glenn? that shows that everybody raised their hands because everybody hates glenn. >> it was a slow of unity at cpac. steve bannon and reince priebus denied reports of

goodbye scott pruitt.e news of these top staffers' resignations today, the day after news broke that scott pruitt had directed yet another senior epa staffer to ask the chick-fil-a corporation for help getting his wife a chick-fil-a franchise. by w of illurating l this government agencyight now, i want to show you th sponse when reporters got news of the first top staffer quitting mr. pruitt's staff today. this is from theatlantic.com,

good thing you rushed the vote on scott pruitt.s end up taking fall because of this growing scandal around him, he will be falling for a much greater height because of the way republicans rushed him into the cabinet. that does it for us tonight. see you again tomorrow. now it's time for the last word with lawrence o'donnell. >> rachel, i have worked on tv dramas where we have tried to write cliff hangers at the end of a particular season or episode, but the cliff hanger you just left us is better than anything we could come up with in tv drama. >> and when the republicans decided they were just going to put a brick on the gas pedal and jump out of the car, they could see the cliff and they did this an

scott pruitt is still in his job. she's gone. but we have new information with the senior counsel that may show this to be an even bigger problem than it's already understood to be. this information come from the committee where carper is the ranging democrat. a staffer on the committee tonight gave us some of the background of what led to this request from senator carper. just so you know, this is exactly how carper put it. "i write to request the inspector general conduct an immediate review of the epa efforts to prevent fraud related to employee -- i am additionally informed that ms. dravis was likely compensated as a full-time employee throughout that time. now we can report that what led to this sort of remarkable claim is that this committee, the environment committee in the senate, was contacted by multiple sources on this matter over a period of four to six weeks, multiple sources contacted the committee via calls, e-mails and in-person meetings, all raising the same issue about samantha drafis being the senior counsel at

pretend you don't even really know scott pruitt's name. this is the first you have ever ard thermighbe any negati whatsoeve concerning scott pruitt and his time as a cabinet official. even if this was it, even if this was the only negative news story that had ever broken about him, ask yourself if you think it seems feasible that he still has this job tonight after this warertafternoo so it's a simple story. scott pruitt got sworn in to be head of the epa in february last year, february 2017. then march, april, may -- three monthster, may 17, ofngor stt uitt at e ep sent this e-mail. from sydney hupp to dan cafey at chick-fil-a. meeting with scott pruitt. good afternoon. hopefully this e-mail finds you well. administrator pruitt asked me to reach out to you and see if you might be willing to get a time set up for the two of to you have a meeting. if there is something i can work with to help get that -- if there's something i can work with to get thatitated i would greatly appreciate it. so this is an executive at an american fast food com

the swampiest is pruitt. he is now reportedly on the verge of rolling back rules requiring cars to be cleaner and more efficient. peru s pruitt is supposed to fly coach when he conducts government business but he's taken dozens of private flights. the epa spent $43,000 to install a soundproof phone booth in his office and he managed to go through $120,000 in public funds for a single trip to italy. that cost is due in part for the roughly 30-person security detail pruitt insists he needs, which is far in excess in the past for epa administrators. then there's his latest ethical breach. >> when he first moved to washington, pruitt lived in this apartment. the owner, the wife of a personal friend, a top energy lobbyist who has multiple clients doing business with the epa. he reportedly paid $50 a night to rent only one room. similar apartments go for $6,000 a month. but sources say he used the entire unit and his daughter, a white house intern at the time, stayed in the other bedroom free of charge. >> now prui

scott pruitt, the attorney general of that state. his office and the top lawyer at the corrections department they decided with this execution date bearing down on them, they were going to figure it out. never mind the protocol, in every mind the rules. lawyers from scott pruitt's office and the corrections office got online and said they just started browsing around. they started basically randomly looking around online to see if they could figure out how long it takes for various drugs to kill people. these are not medical professionalings of any kind who have any expertise. i want to read you litally. wikileaks or whatever. i did my own research, i looked online, you know, what passed the key, wikileaks, wikileaks or whatever it is. that's where they say they found the information. they looked around online. the attorney general of the state is not supposed to be involved in a process like that. picking the actual drugs, that is not the attorney general's purview. nobody in the attorney general's office is expected to have any exp

scott pruitt has resigned from the trump white house. starting monday, pruitt will not have a job. he accepted his resignation letter today. on a lot of levels, it's not really a surprise he had to step down. what's less clear is what changed? joining us now, eric lipton from "the new york times." he's been a scoop machine, covering this issaga. great to you have here. >> thank you. >> let's answer the million dollar question, which is, with all that scott pruitt has gone through, that you've been reporting on up to this point, what changed such that he steps down now? >> i think two things really shifted. one was that early -- the early cycle of stories that we all did, "the washington post", "the new york times" and others were stories about wasteful spending, first class travel, security spending that seemed excessive. but if the recent weeks, we really shifted to things that were quite more serious, and potentially serious ethic violations and potentially even criminal violations. and so, for example, it turns out that the $50 a night condo that he was living in, there was a lo

that didn't get pruitt to resign. nor did any of the others. so what made pruitt hang it up today?at's the height of mount everest. because each day she chooses to take the stairs. at work, at home, even on the escalator. that can be hard on her lower body, so now she does it with dr. scholl's orthotics, clinically proven to relieve and prevent foot, knee or lower back pain, by reducing the shock and stress that travel up her body with every step she takes. so keep on climbing, sarah. you're killing it. dr. scholl's. born to move. you shouldn't be rushed into booking a hotel. with expedia's add-on advantage, booking a flight unlocks discounts on select hotels until the day you leave for your trip. add-on advantage. only when you book with expedia. >>> it has sweet notes. it runs $32 a bottle. it is sold exclusively at ritz carlton hotels and it led to this amazing headline in the "washington post." pruitt enlisted security detail in picking up dry cleaning and moisturizing lotion. quote, the epa administrator went in search of a particular lotion sold only at ritz-carlton hotels. h

that's what you built, scott pruitt, in your office?ery clear when he told congress that's what he had. >> so it's a scif, what we call a sensitive compartmental information facility, is that right? >> there are -- yes. >> ye-- -- yes. we looked at what scott pruitt had bought for his office, and watt epa said publicly about this thing he bought for the office. then we looked at the guidelines for what counts as a scif, and we started wondering, is this $43,000 contraption he put in his office really a scif as scott pruitt said it was and how they justified this as a purchase? i'll tell you. we started asking the epa about it. and over a series of days we got non-answers. we got -- they wouldn't tell us. they wouldn't answer whether or not this followed the guidelines to be a scif, whether it had been certified as a scif. but a few days after we started asking and we couldn't get answers from them, after we brought this to their attention we noticed that the epa and scott pruitt did start talking about this thing differently than they u

scott pruitt is still there.there's any appetite in congress to take this on or at least make him answer questions for stuff? >> that's a legitimate question. the way i look at it is this gives us tangible evidence of the extent to which this white house, and for that matter, almost all the republicans in congress, are willing to overlook unethical behavior in order to accommodate the anti-environmental pro-polluter policies of scott pruitt. the reason they overlook his ethical lapses is they like what he's doing. he's putting profits ahead of public health. and it's the same philosophy that led to the flint water crisis and water problems all over the country. i have a community in this northern part of my district that has contaminated water, they can't drink their water. one of the residents yesterday asked me, where is the epa, and the answer is this is where the epa sits right now. it's pa thetic. >> appreciate your time tonight. >> thank you, rachel. >> stay with us. we'll be right back. epower than the lex

and so, yeah, scott pruitt is taking over as head of the epa, but that also means that scott pruitt willart his new job with the epa as his first big scandal already waiting for him when he walks in the door. oh, boy. >> scott pruitt for epa? oh, boy. ♪ some things are simply impossible to ignore. the strikingly designed lexus nx turbo and hybrid. the suv that dares to go beyond utility. experience amazing. or keeping a hotel's guests cuttinconnected.i to 35,000 fans... businesses count on communication, and communication counts on centurylink. if you have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis isn't it time to let the real you shine through? introducing otezla, apremilast. otezla is not an injection, or a cream. it's a pill that treats plaque psoriasis differently. some people who took otezla saw 75% clearer skin after 4 months. and otezla's prescribing information has no requirement for routine lab monitoring. don't take otezla if you are allergic to any of its ingredients. otezla may increase the risk of depression. tell your doctor if you have a history of depression or suicidal thought

pruitt's job is in jeopardy, few people are coming to mr. prosecute's defense.ing it known they are not pleased with the reports about his housing situation and making it clear that he has few supporters in the west wing. this news is breaking at a time when a handful of trump cabinet officials are phasing -- facing ethics scandals. before he was fired, he was the subject of a scathing report admonishing him for sightseeing and for making sure the v.a. paid for his wife's travel. ryan's travel expenses are right now under investigation by the inspector general of the interior department. the actual agency is investigating a potential hatch act violation for a speech he gave to a hockey team owned by one of his former campaign donors. the treasury secretary donation is under scrutiny for costing taxpayers $1 million for taking military planes on trips across the country. it cost $33,000 for steven mnuchin and his wife to travel to kentucky last year. then there's the $31,000 dining room set that carson told housin and urban development officials to order for ben

>> so pruitt for epa? oh, boy. >> oh, boy.ruitt was confirmed today to head the epa by a vote of 52-46. the epa is about to be taken over by somebody whose mission is n life really appears to be to abolish the agency he's now been put in charge of. he's spent his whole professional career deriding the epa and suing the epa. now as of today he is in charge of it. but you know what? interesti ining thing here, we' still going to get those e-mails. scott pruitt is still subject to that court order. he still really does have to hand other hundreds of those e-mails between his office and oil and gas companies. has to hand over hundreds of them by tuesday. has to hand over thousands more over the next ten days. for whatever reason he has been illegally withholding those thousands of e-mails that document his relationship and his communications with the oil and gas industry which, of course, he'll now be dealing with directly as our new epa administrator so, yeah, scott pruitt is taking over as head of the epa but that means scott pr

according to the "new york times," pruitt was not feeling well.ad a headache. the next day he was still feeling crummy so he ducked out of work early and that's when he dropped off the face of the earth. "on march 29 last year, scott pruitt vanished for several hours after reporting to his staff he was feeling ill. mr. pruitt's staff made repeated phone calls to him that went unanswered. scott pruitt's security detail rushed to his condo -- you know, the one owned by the energy lobbyist -- to make sure he was okay. they tried calling him and pounding on the door thinking he might be unconscious so finally they broke down the door and what they found on the other side was a very confused epa administrator waking up from a nap. oops. the epa footed the bill for that nap. they charged taxpayers $2500 to replace the front door they busted down. this has been by far the one of the stranger scott pruitt scandals, not w standing the secret phone booth. but now the "new york times" has filled in the blanks with e-mails they obtained through the epa throug

old friend of scott pruitt's from oklahoma. his banker, in fact.ad loaned pruitt money to buy a minor league oklahoma baseball team and then he loaned money to the people who bought the team from scott pruitt a few years later. so scott pruitt picked him to overhaul superfund sites and their cleanup in the united states. he hired his old friend at a salary of $172,000 a year. and that salary really turned out to be a handy thing for albert kelly. turned out to be a really good thing for him that he landed that high-paying gig at the epa because not long after he was announced as the head of the epa's new superfund task force federal banking regulators announced that mr. kelly would need to pay a $125,000 fine and he would be banned for life from ever working in the banking industry again. what happened? we don't know what albert kelly did to get himself banned for life from banking. i didn't even know that was a thing. when he agreed to pay the fine, he didn't admit or deny wrongdoing, but yeah, banned for life from banking. and then on to the epa

scott pruitt's amount of scandals.a staffers have come forward over a period of four to six weeks. by phone, e-mail and in person, in person meetings. they have come forward to ie letter the senate committee that there is another scandal of this type at the epa. another senior no show staffer. in this case t a senior council to scott pruitt. she's an official said to be the closest aide to scott pruitt. she has resigned in the past week but according to these staffers who have come forward, she was allegedly being paid full-time even though she wasn't turning up at work for months at a time. for three months between november and january. joining us now is chris lew. he managed obama's senior cabinet. thank you for being here. this is a weird story. >> it is but it's part in parcel of a culture of anything goes. we have seen with pruitt the excessive spending, first class travel. the salaries he gave to a couple of his officials. when you have a culture of misconduct, this is not surprising at all. >> when you were mana

they say it's up to the epa whether or not it wants to try to collect from pruitt.it does not want that $124,000 that scott pruitt improperly spent on upscale travel. "epa believes that the trips where is authorized by an appropriate official make manage cost recovery inappropriate." so now we know. the epa will not be sending scott pruitt a bill to recoup his extra gant spending of taxpayer money because that would be inappropriate. still a mystery what happened to those tactical pants. but we live in hope. ♪ thanks, sam. that does it for you tonight. rachel is back onmond. you can catch me monday at 1:00 and again at 3:00. now it's time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." >> we live in hope. okay. >> we live in hope. >> i'm going to keep that right here. thank you, ali. tens of thousands of people marched through the streets of new york city chanting "i can't breathe" after watching a video of eric garner saying i can't breathe 11 times as he was being choked to death by a new york city police officer five years ago. yesterday, just yesterday a new distur

pruitt's nomination? why are you opposing him? >> so many things. amongst other things as the attorney general of oklahoma, scott pruitt sued the epa 19 times on clean air clean water, on soot, on mercury. right down the whole line. eight of those cases are still pending before the epa so i asked scott pruitt today would he recuse himself from any actions on any of those pending cases and he said that he would not. i said that as long as those cases are pending he's in a fundamental conflict of interest, he's the plaintiff, he's the defendant, he's the judge, and he's the jury. he has to promise the american people that he'll recuse himself as long as those cases are pending. he said that he would not. and so we have a case here where gop is turning into the gas and oil party. where they send the attorney general from oklahoma who sued the epa 19 times to now take other the agency which is responsible for protecting the health and the environment of the people in the united states. >> do you think that this nomination is just a stocking horse for ge

epa scott pruitt disappeared argued to "the new york times" pruitt wasn't feel well. staff he was growingy had a headache the next day still feeling crumby so ducked out early. that's when i kind of just dropped off the face of the earth. quote on march 29th last year scott pruitt vanished for several hours after recording to staff he felt ill. the staff made repeated phone calls that went unanswered. his security detail rushed to his condo owned by the energy lobbyist to make sure he was he was okay. tried pounding on the door thinking he might be unconscious. so finally they straight up broke down the door. and what they found on the other side was a very confused epa administering waking up from a nap. oops. the epa ended up footing the bill for that expensive nap. charged taxpayers $2,500 bucks to replace the front door they busted down. the news has been by far the one of the stranger scott pruitt scandal even notwithstanding the secret phone big time. but now "the new york times" filled in blanc with emails they ob trained the epa through the freedom of informat

it does not want that $124,000 that scott pruitt improperly spent on upscale travel.re authorized by an appropriate official, making cost recovery inappropriate. so you we know. the epa will not be sending scott pruitt a bill to recoup his extravagant spending of taxpayer money because that would be inappropriate. still a mystery, what happened to those tactical pants. we live in hope. thanks, sam. that does it for us tonight. "all in with chris hayes" is next. >>> tonight on "all in,". >> my understanding is that chairman nadler is talking this over with bob mueller. >> as democrats wait for robert mueller. >> mueller report was great. >> exploring the mountains of evidence of presidential malfeasance hiding in plain sight. >>> then congressman al green on his call for impeachment, and how 2020 democrats are messaging their pitches to hold trump presidentab accountable. >> the real way we get these

. >> that's scott pruitt. epa in the trump administration and he's a man serious about baseball. he went to the university of kentucky on a baseball scholarship. played second base, a switch hitter. 2003 he and a friend bought a controlling stake in oklahoma city's minor league triple a team, the oklahoma city red hawks. that stake reportedly cost scott pruitt $6.8 million cash. where did he get the cash? a local banker from oklahoma is reportedly a good friend of scott pruitt's, such a good friend that he helped him put up all that money. then when scott pruitt got to the epa, he called that old friend from tulsa and basically reenacted that scene from "the rookie," you, young man, are headed to the big leagues. that story is next. it doesn't end in a home run for the epa, i will warn you, but that story is next. , like most , i just bought a house. -oh! -very nice. now i'm turning into my dad. i text in full sentences. i refer to every child as chief. this hat was free. what am i supposed to do, not wear it?

it's scott pruitt. here's a taste of scott pruitt on climate change. global warming has inspired one of the major policy debates of our time. that debate is far from settled. scientists continue to disagree about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind. he wrote this in 2016. in 2011 an oil and gas company called devon, says epa letter draft. that's a three-page draft letter. and it's addressed to then epa administrator lisa jackson. and it complains that the epa vastly overstated how much air pollution is coming out of drilling for natural gas in the state of oklahoma. devon energy and this draft letter, they suggested letting the epa know how wrong they are about this issue. so devon energy drafted this letter. but they did not send the letter to the epa. they sent that letter to the oklahoma attorney gp general's office. when scott pruitt got this, he selected select a, c copy, new document, control v, paste and then send. he forwarded the entire draft letter from devon energy directly to the epa. he only

so pruitt said he had no idea about the raises.ails say oh, yes he did that will be interesting to follow up. then there is samantha bradis, one of his senior staffers. she quit last week shortly after senator tom carper of delaware sent this letter to the epa asking the inspector general there to investigate reports that miss davis had not shown up for work for three months, from november 2017 to january 2018, all while getting paid the full time. this is when pruitt took davis and others to that amazing trip to morocco by way of paris. the allegation is that she didn't make to it work for three months, but she did make to it morocco and paris. tonight senator carper got an answer from the inspector general's office. quote, after analyzing your request, we have decided to conduct the requested review. the issues raised in your letter are within the authority of the oig to review, and we will do so. we will inform you and your staff when we complete the review. and then i'll inform you as soon as i hear about it. watch this space t

and now scott pruitt is the nominee to be the head of the epa. the head of the nation's environmental protection agency. and today we learned a little more about how if you like what he's done for oklahoma, you're going to love what he'll do for our country. on the same day that our new president signed the presidential memoranda resurrect the keystone and dakota access pipelines, on the same day, an epa employee surreptitiously got out to the world, that agency has basically been frozen in its tracks, it's been brought to a halt. now there has been no announcement about this from the white house. they did not put out a press release about it. the white house spokesman sean spicer got asked about it today at the white house press briefing. he appeared to have no idea what he was being asked about. the only reason we know about this is that an epa employee took it upon himself or herself to secretly tip somebody off inside a congressional office on capitol hill and somebody in a congressional office on capitol hill then told reporters. that's the

if you don't like that one, may i interest you in the scott pruitt scandal today. he is the former attorney general in oklahoma. he is now having his law license reviewed by the state of oklahoma because he overtly simply clearly lied to the united states senate to when questioned about whether or not he conducted business on his personal e-mail accounts. he did conduct personal business on his e-mail in oklahoma on personal business accounts. he lied to the senate about that. he told them he did not. who cares about e-mail? who cares about lying to the senate. scott isn't a hum drum who cares member of the trump administration. scott may be the most radical cabinet appointment trump has appointed to any agency. today scott pruitt took the almost unprecedented step of throwing out the window's the epa's scientific findings that one particular pesticide is unsafe and should be banned in this country. today scott pruitt took that scientific finding and threw it out the window, set screw it, don't care. and on his own say so, he decided that that own pesticide will no

the fifth new name is also scott pruitt epa guy, the chief of security at scott pruitt's epa, mr. was the driving force behind the epa's massive security expenditures under pruitt, including the soundproof booth -- soundproof booth he put in his office that is definitely not a skiff, even though he told congress it was. nino perrotta was supposed to testify about that today on to house members of the oversight committee. we're told he did show up for that testimony. but 24 hours before he showed up for the testimony, he unexpectedly retired, which isn't sketchy at all. and that brings us to the big fish. today, the trump administration also lost ty cobb, the white house-employed lawyer, not a private lawyer working for the president, but a lawyer working for the white house, so, we've been paying his salary. he has been running point for the white house on all things related to the russia investigation. mr. cobb told "the new york times" that he told the president weeks ago that he was going to retire. okay, maybe. but he didn't mention his impending retirement today in a long int

now, the epa already has a scif at their headquarters before scott pruitt got there, they had one.still there. as far as we know it's not broken. but he argued separate and apart from the the one they had, he needed one of his own. he needed to spend $43,000 of taxpayer money so he could have his own in his office next to his desk, for epa security emergencies. today the government accountability office put out a report about his magic sound booth. they determined they broke the law because it did go over that $5,000 spending cap for changing stuff up in his office. but then they also arrived at a much more difficult to explain conclusion. that super pricey state of the art scif that scott pruitt says he needs to do his job to protect his epa secrets. it might not be a scif. quote, "the epa did not state whether the booth has been certified as a scif." ever since the epa started defending the sound booth to the taxpayers, nobody at the epa has been able to explain what makes it a scif, nobody has been able to show proof that it qualifies as a secure, unhackable place that scott pru

so it's not like scott pruitt is an obscure or controversial figure in the new administration.ing his best to make himself as highly visible as possible by being a real radical when it comes to policy. but even if you like what scott pruitt is doing in terms of policy, he really did lie to the united states senate. he might lose his law license like seven seasons of "fox & friends." even beyond washington, there is stuff going on right now that in any other time would be huge points of focus for the whole country. governor of alabama is probably going to be impeached next week. arkansas is planning to execute eight men in ten days. they're planning on four doubleheader executions. doubleheaders, back-to-back, four of them, using drugs they have never used before. the u.s. military has now launched investigations into the second apparently terribly botched military operation of the young trump era. the first one was the catastrophic raid in yemen, which the new president apparently approved over a dinner with jared. second was a massive air strike in a civilian populated area of

scott pruitt took a trip last year, and part of the reason it cost the taxpayer so much is because itjust scott pruitt, it was first class tickets for himself, his head of security, and staffer, all on the taxpayer dime. it sounds like that should be the worst part of the story but keep reading. the reason pruitt went to morocco in the first place was to pitch the benefit of liquefied natural gas imports on morocco's economy. he's the epa administrator, that is so far out of his lane he's driving on the wrong side of the road. what we do know is at the time he's waxing poetic about natural gas, there was only one in the united states owned by shaner energy and we know scott pruitt was living in shaner energy's lobby's house. the lobbyist firm specifically lobbies on issues related to the export of liquefied natural gas. so today he was living in his house while he was traveling on your dime to go pitch liquefied natural gas imports. i wonder what he was paying for in rent? i wonder if his rent was paid by now it's time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." >> that's a little sw