On Wednesday, Trump’s EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin put a “dagger in the heart” (his own words) of 50-plus years of environmental safeguards. He declared his intention to roll back 31 regulations, including essential landmark protections enshrined in the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts that cut toxic air pollution, curb agricultural, mining, and manufacturing runoff into waterways, and reduce the greenhouse gas emissions responsible for ever-worsening weather disasters, like Hurricane Helene and the LA wildfires.
“While lobbyists and executives from the oil, gas, chemical, and automobile industries celebrated the news, the American public should not,” writes Moms’ Dominique Browning in a blistering response, published this afternoon by U.S. News and World Report.
Tell Administrator Zeldin: Cutting Climate Pollution Is One of EPA’s Most Important Jobs
“Unfortunately, this comes as no surprise,” she continues. “Zeldin’s plan to abandon efforts to safeguard our planet and its people, dubbed ‘Powering the Great American Comeback’ laid out an ominous framework for gutting the EPA’s mission. Instead of ‘protecting the environment and human health,’ the agency’s new vision, he said, is ‘restoring America’s energy dominance.’ That’s code for Trump’s naked catchphrase, ‘Drill, Baby, Drill.’
“The truth is that we already have energy dominance,” Dominique points out. The oil and gas industry is making record profits. Exxon and Chevron, to name just two, have reported some of their biggest earnings in 2023—$36 billion and $35.4 billion, respectively.
This profit comes at the expense of people’s health. Our efforts to cut air pollution, like deadly soot and smog, have been undermined in recent years by longer, more intense wildfire seasons and historically extreme heat, both fueled by global warming, which is in turn fueled by burning fossil fuels. As Dominique reminds us, “The climate crisis and our ongoing air pollution problems are inextricably linked.”
The never-ending pollution-warming-pollution-warming cycle can lead to more pollution and also climate-related health impacts from increased incidence of heart attacks, lung cancer, and adverse birth outcomes to premature death. Not to mention epidemics of insect-borne diseases like dengue, malaria, and Lyme.
“As scientists and medical researchers have learned more about how pollution damages our bodies, the EPA for the last 55 years has done its duty to Americans by defending our health and natural environment,” writes Dominique. Now is absolutely not the time to end this commitment. But here we are.
Dominique concludes, “Like Zeldin, I am a parent. We owe it to our children to be stewards of a healthy world.”
Read the full article in U.S. News and World Report.
Tell Administrator Zeldin: Cutting Climate Pollution Is One of EPA’s Most Important Jobs