Contact: Sasha Tenenbaum, stenenbaum@momscleanairforce.org, (917) 887-0146
Washington, DC – Today, Moms Clean Air Force released the following statement in response to news that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Andrew Wheeler and Acting National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) Administrator James C. Owens have finalized a dangerous rollback to our nation’s greenhouse gas emissions standards for passenger cars and light trucks.
“Even as America is struggling to respond to the global coronavirus pandemic, with millions facing critical healthcare shortages and massive unemployment, the Trump administration isn’t stopping in its relentless campaign to undermine life-saving pollution protections. With its rollback of the clean car standards today, the Trump administration has once again done the unthinkable: it has prioritized polluters’ profits over our families’ health.
“Trump’s EPA makes us sick. We are at a time when we see all too vividly—and sadly—how dangerous it is to put off problems before they overwhelm us. It is abundantly clear that we need to clean up pollution from our transportation sector—the largest source of global warming pollution in the U.S. But today, the Trump administration is reversing years of progress by rolling back clean car standards. This indefensible affront to American families will increase air pollution in our communities, force drivers to spend more at the pump, and exacerbate climate change. No one wants dirtier air, sicker children, or more expensive gas bills. But that’s exactly what we are going to get with this dangerous rollback of greenhouse gas emissions standards for cars and light trucks. Our more than one million members are denouncing this decision for what it is: an attack on public health, the environment, and consumers,” said Dominique Browning, Co-Founder and Senior Director of Moms Clean Air Force.
“This rollback is not an isolated assault on our health,” Browning said. “It is one of the significant ways that Trump’s EPA—led by fossil fuel lobbyist Andrew Wheeler—is making us sick, using the Covid-19 pandemic as cover to undermine public health protections. In addition to weakening clean car standards, Trump’s EPA is:
- Loosening compliance and enforcement of pollution standards, giving industry the freedom to pollute during the coronavirus pandemic;
- Moving forward with a proposal to refuse to strengthen standards protecting us from fine particle pollution;
- Moving to censor the types of scientific research that EPA can consider when setting pollution standards; and
- Gutting protections from toxic mercury emissions.
“Moms are outraged at how little Trump’s EPA, and Administrator Wheeler, care about our health and how much they care about the profits of polluters.”
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
For the past three years, Moms Clean Air Force members have been writing letters, signing petitions, and speaking at public hearings to oppose any rollback to the clean car standards. On May 22, 2018, a delegation of Midwestern moms delivered thousands of signatures to the corporate headquarters of the Big Three automakers (Ford, GM, and Chrysler) in a bid to hold automakers accountable to their promise to make cleaner cars. As parents, we oppose a national program that forces our families into dirtier, less-efficient cars, which contribute to our warming world.
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