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This broadcast is a part of the #OnPoint100 Day Spotlight.

President Obamas EPA chief Gina McCarthy joins us to look at President Trumps early moves on the environment.

Gina McCarthy remembers her confirmation fight to be named chief of the EPA. It lasted a record 136 days, as Republicans fought the hard-nosed climate defender tooth and nail. She ultimately became Barack Obamas last administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Now a new Republican nominee awaits confirmation. And the Trump-era talk is of gutting the EPA. Reversing Obama-era policy. Deriding climate change. This hour On Point, we talk with newly-exited EPA chief Gina McCarthy. Tom Ashbrook

Gina McCarthy, former administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Fellow at the Harvard University Kennedy School of Government. (@GinaEPA)

"This Administration needs to recognize the people in this country and that EPA's mission is to protect public health and the environment. It has been a nonpartisan mission for as long as the 46 years that the agency's been in place...We're there to deliver clean water, clean air and clean land how controversial is that?"

"This isn't just about climate change this is about mercury in our air, toxics in our water. This is about our health."

"I am not Normandy, we're not storming an enemy here. They have to shift from rhetoric to actually governing, and the EPA deserves to be governed."

"The Clean Power Plan, because of where it is in the court system, it would not be over [if the Trump EPA abandoned the plan]. This Administration would have to re-propose a rule to replace it."

"Who is gonna disagree with solar and wind? It's the cheapest energy you can buy today. Why aren't we embracing it?"

"Where is Pruitt? Who is he listening to? Our Clean Power Plan alone had more than fourmillion comments. There is no EPA that has done more to reach out to the public in the energy world than the past EPA has done. How do you not reach out to the public?"

Reuters: EPA head's top regret: failing to connect with rural America "Among the millions of rural Americans who voted for incoming president Donald Trump, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's legacy of hard-nosed regulation earned it a reputation as a jobs killer - a fact that outgoing EPA Director Gina McCarthy says could prove to be one of her biggest regrets."

Washington Post:Defending his legacy, Obama releases more than two dozen Cabinet exit memos-- "EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, by contrast, provided a somewhat drier accounting of her work, but made a similar point in concluding, 'As we pass the baton, we are proud to have run our leg of the race with steadfast vigor, and left a healthier country and a stronger EPA.'"

FiveThirtyEight: What We Learned (And Didnt) About Scott Pruitt At His Confirmation Hearing "Pruitt repeatedly told Democrats that he believed the EPA had an important role to play in regulating carbon dioxide, one of the greenhouse gases implicated in human-caused climate change. But no one on the committee asked him to elaborate on what that role was, what it wasnt, or what he would be doing to fulfill it."

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Obama's EPA Chief On The US And Climate Change46:38 - WBUR

Former President Barack ObamaBarack ObamaMalia Obama pitching film scripts: report Political grandstanding can't discredit Judge Gorsuch's record Centrist Dems won't rule out Supreme Court filibuster MOREs elder daughter is selecting movie scripts for executives at a Hollywood production company, according to a new report.

Malia Obama, 18, began interning with the Weinstein Company this week,TMZ reportedWednesday, adding it confirmed her role in Weinsteins development and production department with sources at the company.

Past hit films produced by Weinstein include The Kings Speech, Silver Linings Playbook, Django Unchained and Good Will Hunting.

Obamareportedly attendedthe 2017 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, last week before starting her internship at the New York-based film company.

Obama interned in 2015 on the set of HBOs hit series Girls before working on actress Halle Berrys CBS show Extant.

The former first daughter is taking a gap year before starting college and purportedly plans on attending Harvard University later this year.

Brothers Bob and Harvey Weinstein founded the Weinstein Company in 2005. Harvey Weinstein endorsed Democratic presidential nominee Hillary ClintonHillary Rodham ClintonEllison tops Perez in DNC race fundraising Malia Obama pitching film scripts: report The Hill's 12:30 Report MORE in the 2016 election.

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Malia Obama pitching film scripts: report - The Hill (blog)

President Trump has decided to leave in place President Barack Obama's 2014 executive order protecting employees from anti-LGBTQ workplace discrimination while working for federal contractors. Here, a marcher in New York's Gay Pride march wears a modified version of a Trump campaign hat last summer. Bryan R. Smith/AFP/Getty Images hide caption

President Trump has decided to leave in place President Barack Obama's 2014 executive order protecting employees from anti-LGBTQ workplace discrimination while working for federal contractors. Here, a marcher in New York's Gay Pride march wears a modified version of a Trump campaign hat last summer.

An executive order protecting gays and lesbians who work for federal contractors "will remain intact" at President Trump's direction, the White House says. The move could allay concerns that Trump might end recently adopted protections against an anti-LGBTQ workplace.

The White House announced the move in a relatively short statement early Tuesday, saying that the president "is determined to protect the rights of all Americans, including the LGBTQ community."

The announcement comes after reports that the White House was considering a new executive order that would undo former President Barack Obama's 2014 executive order that gave new protections to gay and transgender people. When it was signed, the order applied to 28 million workers roughly a fifth of America's workforce.

In today's statement, the White House says, "The President is proud to have been the first ever GOP nominee to mention the LGBTQ community in his nomination acceptance speech, pledging then to protect the community from violence and oppression."

Trump's decision largely conforms with his election campaign, in which he didn't often seek to highlight either gay rights or restrictions.

The new president's plan for his first 100 days didn't mention taking actions to strip LGBTQ rights or protections, but Trump did list as his first priority the canceling of "every unconstitutional executive action, memorandum and order issued by President Obama."

While the persistence of the executive order suggests Trump agrees with Obama's action, civil rights activists have worried that the president might appoint a U.S. Supreme Court justice who has ruled against gay rights. At 8 p.m. ET Tuesday, Trump is scheduled to name his pick to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

After Trump's election, activists on both sides of the issue wondered how his administration might treat legal claims of "religious liberty," a phrase that has been invoked by those who oppose LGBTQ discrimination protections and, in many cases, gay marriage and who say that adjusting to new federal laws requires them to compromise their beliefs.

Excerpt from:
White House Says Obama's Order On LGBTQ Rights Will Stay In Effect - NPR

An article making the rounds on Facebook falsely says that a bronze statue of former President Barack Obama will soon be in the entryway of the White House. But you won't be seeing it any time soon -- or any time at all.

The story is fake.

This fake news story, headlined "WOW: Obama Orders Life-Sized Bronze Statute of Himself To Be Permanently Installed in White House," asserts that in the final hours of his presidency, Obama ordered the $200,000 life-sized statue of himself.

Success Street and Empire News, the sites on which the fake story was published, did not respond to requests for comment. But here are five reasons that ABC News' reporting has revealed this article is fake.

The most compelling aspect of the story is the accompanying photo -- a bronze statue of former President Obama in the Oval Office. But it's not a real photo. The photo of the statue itself was posted in 2013 on a Flickr page run by a user named Paul Sableman. Sableman wrote in a comment that the statue is in San Juan, Puerto Rico. It was Photoshopped with a photo of the Oval Office in the background.

The article attributes the information to "Empire News" -- where the story appears to have surfaced for the first time on Dec. 31, 2016. It was authored by "Bob The Empire News Potato" and contains several misspellings of the word "statue." A disclaimer on a separate page of its website says its articles are "for entertainment purposes only."

The text of the fake news story garners more than 100 hits in a Google search. But the content doesn't appear on the websites of any credible news organizations.

I have been president for only eight years, and in that time, I have done what no other presidents could do in all their time in total, the article claims that Obama said. (He hasn't said this, according to our searches, anywhere but in these articles.)

The story goes on to claim that Obama said his legacy should not be diminished and that he can keep an eye on current President Donald Trump. (Nope, he didn't say that either.)

"The statue will not be allowed to be removed, as every president is allowed to leave one thing in the White House that must never be touched by future presidents," the story states -- falsely.

It goes on to give examples of things left behind by other presidents -- none of which are real. However, tradition does provide that outgoing presidents leave behind a handwritten note for the incoming president.

ABC News has launched "The Real News About Fake News" powered by Facebook data in which users report questionable stories and misinformation circulating on the platform. The stories will undergo rigorous reporting to determine if the claims made are false, exaggerated or out of context. Stories that editorial partners have also debunked will then appear flagged in your News Feed.

See the article here:
No, Former President Obama Didn't Build a Statue of Himself for the White House - ABC News

President Trump and former President Barack Obama walk out prior to Obama's departure during the 2017 presidential inauguration. Getty Images hide caption

President Trump and former President Barack Obama walk out prior to Obama's departure during the 2017 presidential inauguration.

Former President Barack Obama has criticized President Trump's immigration and travel ban issued on Friday, saying through a spokesman that he is "heartened by the level of engagement" over the weekend in opposition to the action.

"In his final official speech as President, he spoke about the important role of citizen[s] and how all Americans have a responsibility to be the guardians of our democracy not just during an election but every day," Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis said in a statement. "Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake."

It is the first public comment from Obama since he left office just over a week ago and departed for a vacation in Palm Springs, Calif. In his final press conference, Obama signaled he would give the new president some deference but that he wouldn't hesitate to speak up if he believed the country's "core values may be at stake," including "systematic discrimination being ratified in some fashion."

The former president apparently felt that was in fact happening with Trump's executive order, which blocked travelers from seven countries, all of which are Muslim-majority Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia for 90 days. New refugee admissions are suspended for 120 days, while Syrian refugees are banned indefinitely. Trump also signaled in a weekend interview with the Christian Broadcast Network that he would give priority to Christian refugees over Muslim refugees. The administration has maintained that the sweeping actions don't constitute a Muslim ban, though.

"With regard to comparisons to President Obama's foreign policy decisions, as we've heard before, the President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion," the statement from Lewis added.

There was confusion across the country over the implementation of the ban, which blocked some valid visa holders from entering and detained many people who had legal status and green cards. Protests sprang up at major international airports, and on Saturday night a federal judge issued a temporary stay blocking the deportation of valid visa holders.

Trump has argued that his new policy is "similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months." However, as the Washington Post points out, that was in response to a specific threat after Iraqi refugees had been found to be colluding against U.S. troops. And the refugee process was slowed, not halted.

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Obama Criticizes Trump's Travel Ban, Says 'Values Are At Stake' - NPR