The Trump administration has once again done the unthinkable: it has prioritized polluters’ profits over our families’ health, this time by rolling back America’s Clean Car Standards.
Even as America is struggling to respond to the global coronavirus pandemic, with millions facing critical healthcare shortages and massive unemployment, this administration isn’t stopping in its relentless campaign to undermine life-saving pollution protections. This is just one in a long string of significant rollbacks.
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. Don’t forget — air pollution is a significant cause of the underlying heart and lung issues that make people more susceptible to COVID-19.
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.
This is just one of the ways Trump’s EPA is making us sick. 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.
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. Now, as parents, we must do everything we can to fight against a national program that forces our families into dirtier, less-efficient cars, which contribute to our warming world.