The Trump administration is set to reassess the official conclusion that greenhouse gases pose risks to public health. This decision threatens to undermine the foundation of U.S. climate regulations amid a significant surge of initiatives aimed at weakening or eliminating pollution restrictions on power plants, vehicles, and waterways.
On Wednesday, Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a sweeping set of pollution rule rollbacks, highlighting plans to possibly revoke a pivotal 2009 determination by the U.S. government that climate-altering gases, such as carbon dioxide, are harmful to human health.
The so-called endangerment finding, established after a Supreme Court decision allowing the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases, serves as the basis for all regulations intended to reduce pollution that scientists have definitively shown is exacerbating the climate crisis.
Despite the immense and escalating evidence of the devastation caused by increasing emissions, which include trillions of dollars in economic consequences, Trump has labeled the climate crisis a “hoax” and dismissed concerns about its intensifying impacts as those of “climate lunatics.”
Lee Zeldin, the EPA administrator, remarked that the agency would review the endangerment finding due to worries it had generated “an agenda that constricts our industries, our mobility, and our consumer options while benefiting foreign adversaries.”
Zeldin declared that Wednesday marked the “most significant day of deregulation in American history,” asserting that “we are driving a dagger through the heart of climate-change doctrine and ushering in America’s Golden Age.”
Environmental advocates responded with alarm to the announcement, pledging to defend the overwhelming scientific consensus and the U.S. capability to tackle the climate crisis through legal action, which had previously overturned many of Trump’s rollbacks during his first term. “The Trump administration’s ignorance is surpassed only by its malice toward the planet,” stated Jason Rylander, legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute.
“Regardless of disastrous weather events like raging fires and lethal heatwaves, Trump and his associates are determined to prioritize polluter profits over people’s lives. This decision will not withstand legal scrutiny. We will fight it every step of the way.”
In total, the EPA announced 31 measures within just a few hours, targeting nearly every major environmental regulation aimed at safeguarding Americans’ air and water quality, as well as ensuring a livable climate.
Among the measures was an initiative to overturn a Biden-era plan aimed at reducing pollution from coal-fired power plants, which itself was a downsized version of an Obama administration effort that was invalidated by the Supreme Court.
The EPA will also reevaluate pollution standards for vehicles, which Zeldin claimed had imposed a “burdensome regulatory framework” on auto manufacturers now transitioning to electric vehicles, contemplate relaxing rules on soot pollution linked to multiple health issues, possibly eliminate requirements for power plants to avoid contaminating waterways or disposing of toxic waste, and will consider narrowing its implementation of the Clean Water Act overall.
This remarkable assault on pollution regulations could, if the courts uphold it, significantly alter the American environment in ways that have not been experienced since major legislation was enacted in the 1970s to end the era of smog-filled skies and burning rivers that became commonplace after American industrialization.
Pollutants from power plants, roadways, and industries lead to various health issues including heart and lung problems, with greenhouse gases contributing to escalating global temperatures and intensifying catastrophic heatwaves, floods, storms, and other consequences.
“Zeldin’s EPA is pulling America back to the pre-Clean Air Act era, when pollution was causing fatalities,” stated Dominique Browning, director of the Moms Clean Air Force. “This is unacceptable and shameful. We will wholeheartedly oppose this cruel, monstrous action to protect our children.”
These developments come shortly after the EPA’s decision to close all its offices focused on the disproportionate pollution burden faced by marginalized communities in the U.S., alongside a significant reduction in agency staff. Zeldin has also directed that $20 billion in grants intended to combat the climate crisis be suspended, citing potential fraud. Democrats are questioning the legality of these actions.
Former EPA personnel have expressed shock over the agency’s drastic changes.
“Today marks the most catastrophic day in EPA history,” remarked Gina McCarthy, who served as EPA administrator under Obama. “Rolling back these regulations is not merely a disgrace; it threatens all of us. The agency has completely abandoned its responsibility to protect Americans’ health and welfare.”
The Trump administration has promised further environmental rollbacks in the upcoming weeks. The Energy Dominance Council, established by the president last month, is seeking to eliminate a wide range of regulations to support the fossil fuel industry, according to interior secretary Doug Burgum at the oil and gas conference CeraWeek in Houston on Wednesday. “We will identify ways to cut red tape,” he stated. “We can easily eliminate 20-30% of our regulations.”
Additional reporting by Dharna Noor
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