Reuters is reporting
that President Obama is leaning toward Gina McCarthy, a former adviser to Republican
Mitt Romney and a cap-and trade advocate, as his next Environmental Protection
Agency administrator.

A top official in charge of air quality at the EPA, McCarthy
served as an environmental policy
adviser to then-Gov. Romney in Massachusetts and launched the state’s first
Climate Protection Action Plan, according to Reuters.

In 2004, McCarthy became head of Connecticut’s Department of
Environmental Protection under then-Governor Jodi Rell, also a Republican, and
helped lead the state into a carbon cap-and-trade system for Northeastern
states, known as the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative

With Obama
signaling that he’s ready for a fight with Congress on climate change
initiatives, Reuters’ sources offered some insight into McCarthy’s no-nonsense style:

“She’s
about the most frank high-level public servant you’ve ever met,” said one
former colleague, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“She’s a good manager, she picks stuff up fast,
and she’s … certainly not afraid of a battle. So if they are anticipating a
very combative Congress, Gina can certainly hold her own.”