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Scott Pruitt on Principles & Values |
Pruitt weighed in on a 2005 Supreme Court case that involved a display of the Ten Commandments at the Texas State Capitol. He argued that prohibiting such displays elevated atheist beliefs above Jewish and Christian ones.
Federal courts have interpreted the Constitution to require the separation of church and state, including a 1947 decision prohibiting New Jersey from using public funds to bus students to Catholic schools.
Pruitt disagreed, saying: "I think the most grievous threat that we have today is this imperialistic judiciary, that has it wrong on what the First Amendment's about and has an objective to create religious sterility in the public square."
[However, on the same radio show in 2005], hHe frequently referred to atheism and humanism, which stresses the potential for humans to be good, as religions that enjoy more rights to expression than Christianity.
Pruitt isn't the first EPA administrator to openly express his or her religious faith, of course. His immediate predecessor, Gina McCarthy, was a Roman Catholic who visited top officials at the Vatican in 2015 as church officials worked to write Pope Francis' climate change encyclical.