By: Julie Kimmel, Senior Manager, Editorial and Member Cultivation, Moms Clean Air Force
Date: August 19, 2025
About: Environmental Protection Agency Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OAR-2025-0194
To: Environmental Protection Agency
Hi, my name is Julie Kimmel. I live with my family in Northern Virginia, and I work with Moms Clean Air Force. I strongly oppose the proposal to rescind the Endangerment Finding, which is foundational to EPA’s ability to protect people across the U.S. from climate emissions.
This weekend, I took my daughter to our local outdoor concert venue for an evening performance. I have been going to this magical nostalgic place since I was a kid. In the summer of 2006, I had a friend who worked there, and we went to see dozens of shows. Every night, we brought an extra layer to put on when it inevitably got a little chilly after sundown. But for the past 10ish years, I’ve rarely needed that extra layer because it’s just not getting that cold at night anymore.
I can’t always trust my memories, so I did look this up. We’ve had 10 more days this summer when the temperature didn’t drop below 70 than we had in 2006. This year to year comparison is, of course, not meaningful on its own, but when you factor in that average temperatures in the DC area have jumped 2.4 degrees since 1970—with so many summer days now in the 90s—and the hottest years on record globally are all in the last decade, it’s hard to deny the earth is heating up.
Yet here I am having to testify about science that has been settled for decades. The earth is warming. That warming is caused by human activities, especially burning fossil fuels for energy, industry, and transportation, and it is endangering human health. We need to keep regulating climate pollution.
My daughter, growing up in the same town I did, is having a childhood disturbingly different from my own. She has swim practices canceled because of wildfire smoke, school recesses moved indoors because of early summer heat waves, and significant anxiety about playing outdoors in the summer heat. I’m grateful she isn’t—or isn’t yet—one of the record-breaking 3,600 cases of heat-related illness in Virginia so far this summer.
My daughter is not alone in her childhood marked by extreme weather—and it is so much worse for so many families—just look at the flooding in Texas Hill Country, the LA wildfires, the unrelenting heat in Phoenix. These events all illustrate that climate change is also an economic issue. Dangerous weather made worse by our warming climate costs families a fortune with high healthcare costs and lives, homes, and livelihoods lost or damaged.
We must keep the Endangerment Finding—and all our climate regulations—because lowering greenhouse gas emissions leads to cleaner air, better health, and safer communities. Thank you.