The Trump administration launched a massive deregulation spree that could gut environmental and health protections in the US, moves that are sure to face immediate legal and logistical challenges.
Wednesday was “the greatest day of deregulation our nation has seen,” Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lee Zeldin said in a press release. The proposed changes include 31 actions to roll back pollution regulations for power plants, oil and gas refineries, chemical plants, cars and trucks, factories, and more.
“This is a cluster bomb”
Advocacy groups, unsurprisingly, are already promising a fight. Outside of court, the EPA — if it follows protocol — would have to go through extensive rulemaking processes. And it has to make this all happen with a shrunken and demoralized workforce.
“This is a cluster bomb of moves to demolish a broad swath of environmental regulations. We’ll see if it explodes in EPA’s face when the inevitable barrage of lawsuits hits the courts,” Michael Gerrard, faculty director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University, said in an email to The Verge.
The EPA says it will “reconsider” a broad swath of regulations on everything including mercury, toxic air pollutants, soot, wastewater, the chemicals used in the workplace, and the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change.
The EPA is also working to claw back $20 billion of Biden-era federal funding to reduce greenhouse gas pollution. Zeldin’s language when it comes to the climate crisis is particularly vociferous. “We are driving a dagger straight into the heart of the climate change religion to drive down cost of living for American families, unleash American energy, bring auto jobs back to the U.S. and more,” he said.
The EPA press release says, without sharing any numbers or analysis, that the proposed measures would make it more affordable to buy a car or run a business. The Trump administration’s tariff wars, however, are expected to raise the cost of a car by up to $12,000.
Federal standards for soot pollution alone, on the other hand, are estimated to lead to $46 billion in net health benefits, according to an EPA analysis last year. Stronger soot protections that were finalized last year were also expected to prevent 290,000 lost workdays and 4,500 premature deaths by 2032.
American Lung Association president and CEO Harold Wimmer said in an emailed statement that the organization “will use every tool in our toolbox to defend these lifesaving protections and protect the health of families.”
The Sierra Club also said in a statement that it would “fight these outrageous rollbacks tooth and nail.” And “should the EPA undo settled law and irrefutable facts, we expect to see this administration in court,” environmental law organization Earthjustice said in another statement.
“It is important to remember that currently, all these clean air protections are still in place. EPA’s leadership can’t undo them with this announcement. They have to follow the law and go through a process to reconsider or revoke them,” the American Lung Association’s Wimmer added.
President Donald Trump managed to roll back around 100 environmental regulations during his first term in office. This time around, he’s moving much quicker to enact sweeping changes. But the wrecking ball that Trump and billionaire ally Elon Musk have taken to federal agencies could also make it harder to implement their agenda at the EPA.
“In order to revoke or revise a regulation, you need a new regulation,” Columbia’s Gerrard notes. It takes skilled staff to write detailed explanations to justify such drastic changes in the EPA’s position, according to Gerrard. Courts could invalidate new rules without those explanations, and it’s unclear who would be left at the agency to do that work as the Trump administration slashes the federal workforce, he says.
In February, the EPA notified 1,100 probationary workers that they could be terminated immediately. The agency has already fired hundreds of staffers. Trump has also floated and walked back the idea of cutting 65 percent of the agency’s staff. And the EPA’s actions announced this week include “terminating Biden’s environmental justice and DEI arms of the agency” — encompassing roles that address the ways in which low-income communities and Americans of color are often disproportionately exposed to pollution.
The announcements made yesterday mark “the most disastrous day in EPA history,” according to an emailed statement from former EPA administrator and White House national climate adviser Gina McCarthy.
“They’re doing the bidding of their fossil fuel friends,” McCarthy said. Trump received more than $75 million from oil and gas interests while campaigning on a platform to “drill, baby, drill.”
According to McCarthy, “The agency has fully abdicated its mission to protect Americans’ health and wellbeing.”
