US Politics in Trump era
‘Biggest Loss of Clean Water Protection the Country Has Ever Seen’: Trump Guts Safeguards for US Streams and Wetlands
The Trump administration is set to continue its corporate friendly assault on U.S. environmental regulations Thursday by finalizing a rule that will allow companies, landowners, and property developers—including golf course owners like the president—to dump pesticides and other pollutants directly into many of the nation's streams and wetlands, potentially threatening the drinking water of millions of Americans.
Trump Moves to Exempt Big Projects From Environmental Review
The Keystone Oil Spill No One’s Talking About Will Be Nearly Impossible to Clean Up
E.P.A. to Roll Back Rules to Control Toxic Ash from Coal Plants
Keystone Pipeline Leaks 383,000 Gallons of Oil in North Dakota
Trump administration to revoke California’s power to set stricter auto emissions standards
The Trump administration plans to revoke California’s right to set stricter air pollution standards for cars and light trucks , according to two senior administration officials, as part of a larger effort to weaken an Obama-era climate policy aimed at cutting greenhouse gas emissions from the nation’s auto fleet.
Trump Administration to Finalize Rollback of Clean Water Protections
The Trump administration on Thursday is expected to complete the legal repeal of a major Obama-era clean water regulation, which had placed limits on polluting chemicals that could be used near streams, wetlands and water bodies. Weakening the Obama-era water rule had been a central campaign pledge for Mr. Trump, who characterized it as a federal land-grab that impinged on the rights of farmers, rural landowners and real estate developers to use their property as they see fit.
Trump Administration Weakens Protections for Endangered Species
Trump’s EPA Sides with Water Polluters in Major Case
If you like sewage, chemical wastes or radioactive molecules in your drinking water the Trump Administration has your back. It’s part of Team Trump’s determined efforts to remake the Environmental Protection Agency into the Environmental Pollution Agency. Soon the U.S. Supreme Court, urged on by Team Trump, may give its stamp of approval to effectively undo many benefits of the 1972 Clean Water Act in a case from the Hawaiian island of Maui.
Automakers, Rejecting Trump Pollution Rule, Strike a Deal With California
E.P.A. Plans to Curtail the Ability of Communities to Oppose Pollution Permits
83 Environmental Rules Being Rolled Back Under Trump
Automakers Tell Trump His Pollution Rules Could Mean ‘Untenable’ Instability and Lower Profits
Many of the world’s largest automakers joined together Thursday to tell President Trump that one of his most sweeping deregulatory efforts — his plan to weaken pollution standards for automobiles — threatens to hurt their profitability and produce “untenable” instability in one of the nation’s most important manufacturing sectors.
Trump Administration Hardens Its Attack on Climate Science
Trump’s ‘pro-life’ administration just killed a program on children’s health
For more than 20 years, the federal Environmental Protection Agency and National Institutes of Health have partnered to fund a unique nationwide program studying environmental impacts on children’s health. No more. The Trump administration is zeroing out the EPA contribution to the program, forcing many of the 13 university-based research centers to curtail their multiyear projects and leaving the NIH to scramble for a rescue plan.
Issuing ‘Death Sentence’ to Gray Wolves, Trump Admin Moves to Gut Federal Protections
Conservation groups were up in arms Wednesday after the Trump administration moved to strip federal protections from gray wolves. "This disgusting proposal would be a death sentence for gray wolves across the country," said Collette Adkins, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. "The Trump administration is dead set on appeasing special interests that want to kill wolves."
U.S. Carbon Emissions Surged in 2018 Even as Coal Plants Closed
America’s carbon dioxide emissions rose by 3.4 percent in 2018, the biggest increase in eight years, according to a preliminary estimate published Tuesday. Strikingly, the sharp uptick in emissions occurred even as a near-record number of coal plants around the United States retired last year, illustrating how difficult it could be for the country to make further progress on climate change in the years to come, particularly as the Trump administration pushes to roll back federal regulations that limit greenhouse gas emissions.
E.P.A. Proposes Rule Change That Would Let Power Plants Release More Toxic Pollution
President Trump’s Retreat on the Environment Is Affecting Communities Across America
In just two years, President Trump has unleashed a regulatory rollback, lobbied for and cheered on by industry, with little parallel in the past half-century. Mr. Trump enthusiastically promotes the changes as creating jobs, freeing business from the shackles of government and helping the economy grow. The trade-offs, while often out of public view, are real — frighteningly so, for some people — imperiling progress in cleaning up the air we breathe and the water we drink, and in some cases upending the very relationship with the environment around us.
Trump’s EPA plans to lift CO2 limits on coal power plants
The Environmental Protection Agency, now led by acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler, a former coal lobbyist, has announced more rollbacks regulations on coal-fired power plants. It’s a striking move for two big reasons: No new coal plants are being built in the US, and the EPA itself (along with 12 other federal agencies) recently put out a sweeping report detailing the need to reduce emissions from fossil fuels because of the grave threat of climate change.
The EPA’s Climate Change Page Is Just Gone Now
EPA.gov pages that previously provided information about climate change have been changed from claiming that they are "updating" to an error message that reads, "We want to help you find what you are looking for," as revealed by a report released this week by the Environmental Data & Governance Initiative. The change indicates that information related climate change is not being “updated,” but removed entirely.
Driven by Trump Policy Changes, Fracking Booms on Public Lands
The parade of trailer trucks rolling through Jay Butler’s dusty ranch is a precursor to a new fracking boom on the vast federal lands of Wyoming and across the West. Reversing a trend in the final years of the Obama presidency, the Trump administration is auctioning off millions of acres of drilling rights to oil and gas developers, a central component of the White House’s plan to work hand in glove with the industry to promote more domestic energy production.
Trump Administration Wants to Make It Easier to Release Methane Into Air
Trump administration’s rewrite of Clean Power Plan will be a boon to the coal industry
The Trump administration is poised Tuesday to unveil a sweeping rewrite of emissions rules for power plants that would be a boon to the coal industry, laying the groundwork for a revival of the most polluting facilities and abandoning Obama-era mandates for reorienting the electricity sector toward clean energy.
Endangered Species Act stripped of key provisions in Trump administration proposal
The real story behind Trump’s pardon of Oregon ranchers
President Trump pardoned two Oregon ranchers Tuesday, firing a new salvo in a complicated culture war previously marked by air-mailed sex toys, nuanced disputes over the management of public lands, and a police shootout that killed a would-be leader of a modern crackpot revolution. But the details of Trump’s move indicate he is less interested in reversing an unjust sentence than he is in giving a thinly-veiled “attaboy” to a small group of heavily armed chaos agents who seek to undermine the federal government’s proper role in managing public lands all across the western U.S.
Trump administration plan to mine near popular Minnesota wilderness area sparks multiple lawsuits
The Chemical Industry Scores a Big Win at the E.P.A.
A Courtside View of Scott Pruitt’s Cozy Ties With a Billionaire Coal Baron
The E.P.A. chief, who has reversed Obama-era rules on coal mining, enjoyed a superfan experience at a University of Kentucky basketball game — courtesy of an industry executive. But there was more to the game last December than a superfan experience for Mr. Pruitt and his son, who joined him. They sat in seats belonging to Joseph W. Craft III, a billionaire coal executive who has engaged in an aggressive campaign to reverse the Obama administration’s environmental crackdown on the coal industry. Mr. Craft and his wife donated more than $2 million to support President Trump’s candidacy and inauguration.
U.S. EPA grants biofuels waiver to billionaire Icahn’s oil refinery
The waiver enables Icahn’s CVR Energy Inc (CVI.N) to avoid tens of millions of dollars in costs related to the U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) program. The regulation is meant to cut air pollution, reduce petroleum imports and support corn farmers by requiring refiners to mix billions of gallons of biofuels into the nation’s gasoline and diesel each year.
EPA announces an end to California’s fuel economy waiver day after Pruitt says the opposite
Just one day after Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt told lawmakers on Capitol Hill that the agency did not have plans “at present” to target California’s special fuel economy waiver, the Trump administration announced that it would be putting a six-year hold on Obama-era standards for fuel efficiency, starting in 2020, while at the same time revoking California’s waiver to set its own standards.
Scott Pruitt’s Dirty Politics
Pruitt and his admirers call this approach “E.P.A. originalism”—a nod to the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and his reading of the Constitution. The idea is that Pruitt is sticking to “traditional” priorities, such as cleaning up Superfund sites and contaminated drinking-water supplies, rather than focussing on newer and broader environmental threats, such as climate change.
E.P.A. Prepares to Roll Back Rules Requiring Cars to Be Cleaner and More Efficient
Trump budget seeks 23 percent cut at EPA, eliminating dozens of programs
The White House is seeking to cut more than $2.5 billion from the annual budget of the Environmental Protection Agency — an overall reduction of more than 23 percent. The fiscal 2019 proposal released Monday marks the Trump administration’s latest attempt to shrink the reach of an agency the president once promised to reduce to “little tidbits.” The EPA already has lost hundreds of employees to buyouts and retirements over the past year, and its staffing is now at Reagan-era levels.
White House seeks 72 percent cut to clean energy research, underscoring administration’s preference for fossil fuels
Trump’s Tariffs on Solar Mark Biggest Blow to Renewables Yet
President Donald Trump dealt his biggest blow to the renewable energy industry yet.On Monday, Trump approved duties of as much as 30 percent on solar equipment made outside the U.S., a move that threatens to handicap a $28 billion industry that relies on parts made abroad for 80 percent of its supply.
Trump Moves to Open Nearly All Offshore Waters to Drilling
The Trump administration will allow new offshore oil and gas drilling in nearly all United States waters, it announced Thursday. The plan would give the energy industry broad access to drilling rights in most parts of the outer continental shelf, including Pacific waters near California, Atlantic waters near Maine and the eastern Gulf of Mexico.
Trump’s true priorities revealed in holiday news dumps
In the week that followed, Trump kept giving his members new reasons to celebrate. While cable news fixated on how much he was golfing – his political appointees back in Washington worked overtime to deconstruct the administrative state, eviscerate several of Barack Obama’s signature achievements and roll back significant environmental protections. Like Richard Nixon’s attorney general John Mitchell said, watch what they do — not just what they say. Trump campaigned like a populist. Now more than ever, he’s governing like a plutocrat.
How Scott Pruitt turned the EPA into one of Trump’s most powerful tools
Since 2010, the Environmental Protection Agency has been embroiled in an enforcement battle with a Michigan-based company accused of modifying the state’s largest coal-fired power plant without getting federal permits for a projected rise in pollution. On Dec. 7, as the Supreme Court was considering whether to hear the case, EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt issued a memo that single-handedly reversed the agency’s position. No longer would the EPA be “second-guessing” DTE Energy’s emission projections.
Trump to slash safety regulations put in place after nation’s worst environmental disaster
During the Obama administration, the federal government took action to prevent another Deepwater Horizon-sized oil spill, widely viewed as the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history. After taking office, the Trump administration immediately began making plans to relax certain offshore drilling rules implemented after the 2010 disaster.
New York’s Attorney General in Battle With Trump
Eric Schneiderman’s office recently took legal or administrative action against “the biggest threat” to New Yorkers: the federal government. By moving to sue the Federal Communications Commission over net neutrality this month, his office took its 100th legal or administrative action against the Trump administration and congressional Republicans. His lawyers have challenged Mr. Trump’s first, second and third travel bans and sued over such diverse matters as a rollback in birth control coverage and a weakening of pollution standards.
E.P.A. Officials, Disheartened by Agency’s Direction, Are Leaving in Droves
More than 700 people have left the Environmental Protection Agency since President Trump took office, a wave of departures that puts the administration nearly a quarter of the way toward its goal of shrinking the agency to levels last seen during the Reagan administration.Of the employees who have quit, retired or taken a buyout package since the beginning of the year, more than 200 are scientists.
Trump Says His Regulatory Rollback Already Is the ‘Most Far-Reaching’
U.S. Report Says Humans Cause Climate Change, Contradicting Top Trump Officials
E.P.A. Cancels Talk on Climate Change by Agency Scientists
Organizers of a Monday conference on the Narragansett Bay were told three E.P.A. scientists would not be allowed to present their work. Scientists involved in the program said that much of the discussion at the event centers on climate change. Many said they were surprised by the E.P.A.’s last-minute cancellation, particularly since the agency helps to fund the Narragansett Bay Estuary Program, which is hosting the conference. The scientists who have been barred from speaking contributed substantial material to a 400-page report to be issued on Monday.
Why Has the E.P.A. Shifted on Toxic Chemicals? An Industry Insider Helps Call the Shots
E.P.A. Announces Repeal of Major Obama-Era Carbon Emissions Rule
Trump Takes a First Step Toward Scrapping Obama’s Global Warming Policy
E.P.A. Chief’s Calendar: A Stream of Industry Meetings and Trips Home
Since taking office in February, Mr. Trump’s E.P.A. chief has held back-to-back meetings, briefing sessions and speaking engagements almost daily with top corporate executives and lobbyists from all the major economic sectors that he regulates — and almost no meetings with environmental groups or consumer or public health advocates, according to a 320-page accounting of his daily schedule from February through May, the most detailed look yet at what Mr. Pruitt has been up to since he took over the agency.
Perry proposes law to force Americans to buy dirtier, costlier power
To make his case, Perry has fabricated an economic threat to U.S. grid reliability from cheap renewables and then proposed a rule to account for the imaginary reliability benefit of other electricity sources — all the while ignoring the actual health and environmental costs of carbon pollution from burning coal that aren’t priced in to the market yet.
How Exxon Mobil May Soon Have Greater Sway Over Science Used in EPA Policies
The list of potential candidates for the EPA's scientific advisory boards includes many oil and gas industry representatives and consultants. While industry has always had a voice on those panels, comments from the Trump administration and the potential new appointees suggest the balance may soon change in favor of greater power for regulated companies, particularly the oil and gas industries.
Trump names climate science denier to run NASA – ThinkProgress
In a Friday night news dump, the White House announced that President Donald Trump Plans to nominate Rep. Jim Bridenstine (R-OK), a climate science denier to be administrator of NASA. Bridenstine is a politician without any scientific credentials, unlike previous NASA chiefs, and for that reason his nomination has already been criticized by both Florida’s senators Marco Rubio (R) and Bill Nelson (D), Politico reports. Rubio said, “I just think [his nomination] could be devastating for the space program.”
Scott Pruitt Is Carrying Out His E.P.A. Agenda in Secret, Critics Say
Mr. Pruitt, according to the employees, who requested anonymity out of fear of losing their jobs, often makes important phone calls from other offices rather than use the phone in his office, and he is accompanied, even at E.P.A. headquarters, by armed guards, the first head of the agency to ever request round-the-clock security. A former Oklahoma attorney general who built his career suing the E.P.A., and whose LinkedIn profile still describes him as “a leading advocate against the EPA’s activist agenda,” Mr. Pruitt has made it clear that he sees his mission to be dismantling the agency’s policies — and even portions of the institution itself.
House slashes funding for clean energy, restores funding for fossil fuel research
Repeal of Obama-era environmental rules dominates Trump’s regulatory agenda
This week, the Trump administration defied its “America First” rhetoric with a policy change that would make it easier for companies to hire guest workers from foreign countries. The Trump Organization is already poised to benefit from it. On Monday, the Department of Homeland Security raised the cap on H-2B visas for foreign guest workersfrom 66,000 visas per year to 81,000. On Thursday — just three days later — Trump’s properties told the Department of Labor that they wanted approval to hire 76 guest workers using those visas.
I’m a scientist. I’m blowing the whistle on the Trump administration.
On July 19, the former top climate policy official at the Department of Interior filed a complaint and a whistleblower disclosure form with the Office of Special Counsel. The official, Joel Clement, says the Trump administration is threatening public health and safety by trying to silence scientists like him. I was reassigned to an unrelated job in the accounting office that collects royalty checks from fossil fuel companies.
While You Were Busy Watching Don Jr., You Missed Some Interesting Trump Administration Nominees
President Donald Trump is slowly working his way through nominating people for posts related to Western natural resources and the environment; several nominations came down this week. There are more than 1,200 White House appointees that must be vetted by Senate committee, then confirmed by a majority of the full Senate.
Federal court blocks Trump EPA on air pollution
An appeals court Monday struck down the Environmental Protection Agency’s 90-day suspension of new emission standards on oil and gas wells, a decision that could set back the Trump administration’s broad legal strategy for rolling back Obama-era rules. In a 2-to-1 ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit concluded that the EPA had the right to reconsider a 2016 rule limiting methane and smog-forming pollutants emitted by oil and gas wells but could not delay the effective date while it sought to rewrite the regulation.
EPA seeks to scrap rule protecting drinking water for third of Americans
The Environmental Protection Agency is poised to dismantle the federal clean water rule, which protects waterways that provide drinking water for about a third of the US population. The EPA, with the US army, has proposed scrapping the rule in order to conduct a “substantive re-evaluation” of which rivers, streams, wetlands and other bodies of water should be protected by the federal government.
The Trump Administration Just Greenlit a Project That Will Devastate California’s Most Fragile Ecosystems
Over the strong objections of environmental groups and concerns raised by some of their own scientists, federal wildlife agencies on Monday approved the construction of $14-billion set of tunnels that will on average divert 20 percent of the California’s ecologically sensitive Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers to Southern California cities and farms.
EPA halts Obama-era methane emissions rule for oil and gas industry
The Trump administration’s Environmental Protection Agency ordered a halt on Wednesday to an Obama-era rule created to reduce methane leaks from new and modified oil and natural gas drilling wells. The action places a 90-day stay on portions of the rule, set in 2016, that requires oil and gas companies to detect and repair leaks of methane and other air pollution at new operations.
There’s Finally a Dollar Amount Attached to How Much Trump Hates the EPA
President Donald Trump reserves a special level of antipathy for the Environmental Protection Agency. He campaigned on eliminating the EPA "in almost every form," and his budget director, Mick Mulvaney, declared that its climate change programs "waste your money." But his full budget wish list released Tuesday actually assigns a dollar value to his promises. In it, the EPA faces the steepest cut of any agency or department across the government, a 31.4 percent reduction, to $5.7 billion, its lowest level in 40 years.
How Rollbacks at Scott Pruitt’s E.P.A. Are a Boon to Oil and Gas
Mr. Trump and his team believe that loosening the regulatory grip on business will help the economy, create jobs and allow Americans “to share in the riches,” as he said during the campaign. But in the energy field, environmentalists, Democrats and even some in the industry fear the efforts will backfire, harming health and safety without creating much economic benefit.
Donald Trump to turn off EPA’s data service, one of government’s most important websites
Donald Trump is to shut down one of the government's most important data services. The Environmental Protection Agency's Open Data Web service – which stores information on climate change, life cycle assessment, health impact analysis and environmental justice – is to have its funding removed and will no longer be in operation, according to people working on the plan. A pop-up on the site appears to confirm the shutdown, with anyone visiting the Open Data page told that the site will not be operational from Friday.
Scott Pruitt calls for an ‘exit’ to the Paris accord, sharpening the Trump administration’s climate rift
EPA chief doubts carbon dioxide’s role in global warming
He told CNBC that measuring human impact on the climate was "very challenging" and there was "tremendous disagreement" about the issue. Mr Pruitt instead insisted that officials needed "to continue the debate" on the issue. His remarks contradict his own agency's findings on greenhouse gas emissions.
Leashes Come Off Wall Street, Gun Sellers, Miners and More
In a flurry of deregulation, the Trump administration has already suspended or reversed more than 90 rules. And industry is clamoring for more. Telecommunications giants like Verizon and AT&T will not have to take “reasonable measures” to ensure that their customers’ Social Security numbers, web browsing history and other personal information are not stolen or accidentally released.Wall Street banks like Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase will not be punished, at least for now, for not collecting extra money from customers to cover potential losses from certain kinds of high-risk trades that helped unleash the 2008 financial crisis.
‘Just racist’: EPA cuts will hit black and Hispanic communities the hardest
Planned cuts at the Environmental Protection Agency are set to fall heaviest upon communities of color across the US that already suffer disproportionately from toxic pollution, green groups have warned. Proposal would remove environmental justice office, tasked with bridging gap in pollution in black, Hispanic and low-income areas and wealthier white ones
White House proposes steep budget cut to leading climate science agency
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is in the crosshairs of the White House. The White House is seeking to slash the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s budget by 17 percent, imposing big cuts to research and satellite programs, according to a memo obtained by The Washington Post.
Zinke rescinds Obama official’s phase-out of lead bullets, fishing tackle
HUNTING-FISHING -- Today, on his first day on duty, Department of the Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke (pronounced ZINK-ee) issued two secretarial orders. One withdraws a controversial order signed by an Obama administration official to phase out use of lead bullets and lead fishing tackle on federal wildlife refuges.