That's not how the current administrative state operates. The white house can nominate the head of the EPA (and a layer of bureaucrats beneath them) and the Senate must approve the nominations. These are political appointees.
The white house cannot say "fire person X" who works for the EPA but was not nominated, because there is (supposed to be) a wall between the political appointees, who must be confirmed by the Senate, and the professional appointees, who are supposed to be protected by a web of laws and whistleblower protections.
So while many people think that the President is the "head" of the administration and can just order it to do whatever he wants, that's not how it's supposed to work. The set of things the EPA is supposed to be doing is set by legislation and the manner in which it does things is also subject to oversight. That doesn't actually stop the politicization of these agencies -- e.g. the CDC studying racism as a public health crisis or gun crime as a disease, or having the IRS investigate conservative groups, etc. The boundary of this tug of war in which the President tries to order an agency to do X and his opponents sue him saying "you can't do this" is exactly the issue of lawfare and the constitutionality of various executive orders. Many such attempts at directing Federal agencies fail or are ruled unconstitutional, but the overall effects of appointing ideologues to leadership positions is felt in things like the newspeak so common now in public announcements.
The white house cannot say "fire person X" who works for the EPA but was not nominated, because there is (supposed to be) a wall between the political appointees, who must be confirmed by the Senate, and the professional appointees, who are supposed to be protected by a web of laws and whistleblower protections.
So while many people think that the President is the "head" of the administration and can just order it to do whatever he wants, that's not how it's supposed to work. The set of things the EPA is supposed to be doing is set by legislation and the manner in which it does things is also subject to oversight. That doesn't actually stop the politicization of these agencies -- e.g. the CDC studying racism as a public health crisis or gun crime as a disease, or having the IRS investigate conservative groups, etc. The boundary of this tug of war in which the President tries to order an agency to do X and his opponents sue him saying "you can't do this" is exactly the issue of lawfare and the constitutionality of various executive orders. Many such attempts at directing Federal agencies fail or are ruled unconstitutional, but the overall effects of appointing ideologues to leadership positions is felt in things like the newspeak so common now in public announcements.
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