4 more get major gigs
EPA pick hit as ‘dangerous’
AMID A FLURRY of cabinet appointments Wednesday, President-elect Donald Trump pushed forward in filling out the remaining vacancies in his growing administration.
He tapped retired Marine Gen. John Kelly to be his homeland security chief, Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad as ambassador to China and Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt to lead the Environmental Protection Agency.
Trump’s decision to pick Pruitt — an ardent opponent of President Obama’s measures to reduce climate change — angered Democrats and environmental year in which he said such science is “far from settled.”
Trump also chose Kelly to head the Department of Homeland Security. He would be the third former general to join Trump’s cabinet if confirmed, following Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, the designated national security adviser, and Marine Gen. James Mattis, the designated defense secretary.
Kelly, 66, retired earlier this year as commander of U.S. Southern Command, capping a decorated, four-star career in the Marines.
In 2010, his son, Lt. Robert Kelly, was killed in Afghanistan.
People close to the transition team also said Trump had decided PRESIDENT-ELECT Donald Trump signaled he may soften his immigration stance — saying in an interview released Wednesday that he’s open to helping children who entered the country illegally stay in the U.S.
That would be a revision that reform advocates are cautiously cheering.
Trump, who campaigned on a promise to deport nearly 11 million undocumented people, told Time magazine he wanted to find a solution on immigration “that’s going to make people happy and proud.”
Trump also expressed a desire to help children whose parents brought them into the country illegally.