the upcoming presidential election. In December 2016, Gove defended a Vote Leave claim that an additional £350 million a week could be spent on the NHS when Britain left the EU. Gove said the figure was robust and it was up to the Government to decide how to spend it. In his capacity as a writer for The Times, Gove gave the first British post-election interview to Donald Trump in January 2017, along with Kai Diekmann from Bild, making him the second British politician to meet Trump as President-elect of the United States after Nigel Farage. Despite preferring Hillary Clinton to Trump as President of the United States, Gove's interview and consequent defence of it was seen by some as praising the President-elect unduly. Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (2017–2019) After the 2017 general election, Gove was promoted to Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs by May during a reshuffle. Gove said he "was quite surprised" to be asked to join the cabinet after May dismissed him in 2016 after she became Prime Minister. After his appointment, Gove announced that a microbead ban would be put into place by the end of 2017. The ban arrived in early 2018. It meant that manufacturers could no longer produce the tiny beads used in cosmetics and care products. Another ban came in June 2018 which stopped shops from selling products that contained the beads. The reasoning behind the ban was to stop the beads harming marine life. In July 2017, Gove announced that a fuel combustion vehicle ban will be put into place due to air pollution. He said that the ban would take effect by 2040 and end the sales of new fuel combustion cars, trucks, vans, and buses that have petrol and diesel engines in the UK. The ban does not include plug-in hybrid vehicles. Gove introduced a ban on bee-harming pesticides like neonicotinoids. He was praised by Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven for his strong stance on issues like bee-harming pesticides, single-use plastic bottles and the future of the internal combustion engine", adding "Gove has defied many people's expectations on the environment". In October 2017, Gove issued an apology for a joke which compared tough interviews on the Today programme to a sexual encounter with Harvey Weinstein. He was criticised by political opponents who felt allegations of sexual abuse were not