The Bush administration forced out the U.S. EPA’s top Midwest regulator on Thursday, after months of contention over a pollution case involving Dow Chemical, the Chicago Tribune reports. Mary Gade, who was appointed by President Bush in 2006, had been tussling with Dow over plans to get the company to clean up extensive dioxin pollution that it dumped into Michigan waterways for decades. Dow asked EPA headquarters to intervene in the dispute, and top deputies to EPA chief Stephen Johnson repeatedly questioned Gade about the case. Then she was stripped of her authority and told to quit or be fired. “There is no question this is about Dow,” Gade said. “I stand behind what I did and what my staff did. I’m proud of what we did.”
