EPA threatens to close New York City office after Trump threats to 'anarchist' cities

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the first agency following through on President Trump’s pledge to withhold federal funds from “anarchist” jurisdictions, threatening to remove an agency office from Manhattan due to alleged safety concerns. The Justice Department on Monday named New York, along with Portland, Ore., and Seattle as such cities as Trump has sought to politicize protests as part of his law-and-order image heading into the final weeks of the campaign. In a letter to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio (D), EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler characterized summer protests in the city as a danger to the agency’s Manhattan office. “If you cannot demonstrate that EPA employees will be safe accessing our New York City offices, then I will begin the process of looking for a new location for our regional headquarters outside of New York City that can maintain order. I have an obligation to our employees, and if the city is unwilling or incapable of doing its job, I will do mine and move them to a location that can competently fulfill the basic mission of a local government,” Wheeler wrote in the letter first reported by the New York Post...MORE