Environmental Protection Agency leader Scott Pruitt was among friends in Colorado Thursday, a guest of the Colorado Livestock Association at a ranch south of Last Chance.

The EPA held a meeting at the same Colorado location two years ago as the agency finalized the Waters of the U.S. rule, despised across much of rural America as an unwarranted government overreach. Farmers and ranchers supported Pruitt’s nomination to the lead the agency. He met with about 30 ag producers in the windbreak of an Eastern Plains community Thursday, according to a source at the private meeting who took notes for Colorado Politics.

Last week the Trump administration stepped up its push to narrow the rule, which could be used against farming operations, such as dried streambeds that fall under federal oversight and control. After he spoke, the EPA leader toured the ranch’s dry washes and stream beds that escaped federal control, and remain under state oversight, at least partially because of him.

As Oklahoma’s attorney general, Pruitt led a 19-state request for an injunction against the Obama-era rule on clean water, winning a stay on enforcement. During his confirmation hearing in February, he said the EPA needed to clarify the rule so it could be enforced appropriately.

President Trump signed a March 28 executive order giving Pruitt the go-ahead.

Pruitt is scheduled to be in southeast Colorado Friday to visit the site of the EPA-caused Gold King Mine Spill in 2015.

Our solidly credible source tells Colorado Politics that Pruitt said that under the last administration, the EPA tried to create regulatory certainty, but “they failed miserably.”

The rule “was not about water quality and not about environmental outcomes, it was about expanding their power,” Pruitt said.

He said the repeal process is underway and a replacement is in the works. The agency hopes to have it done in the first quarter of next year, Pruitt said.

The new rule would focus on creating certainty about “where federal jurisdiction ends and the states begins,” he said.

Pruitt told the ag producers in Last Chance the final rule would include a definition of what Waters of the United States are, as well as what they are not.

The Colorado Farm Bureau posted pictures of the meeting on its Facebook page Thursday. President Don Shawcroft subsequently provided a comment to Colorado Politics about the meeting.

“It was a privilege to meet with Administrator Pruitt today,” he said. “He is clearly committed to working cooperatively with the states, and with industry to develop policies that will provide the most environmental protection with the least negative impact on agriculture and the economy. I look forward to watching his agency shape policy that is consistent, clear cut and predictable.”

Pruitt said he would make sure the EPA works with industries and states to find solutions that work.

“This is not a campaign issue,” he said. “This is about making things work for the American people.”