Environmental Health

"The Environmental Protection Agency is planning to eliminate long-standing requirements for polluters to collect and report their emissions of the heat-trapping gases that cause climate change. The move, ordered by a Trump appointee, would affect thousands of industrial facilities across the country, including oil refineries, power plants and coal mines as well as those that make petrochemicals, cement, glass, iron and steel, according to documents reviewed by ProPublica."

"When a gold mine in rural Liberia spewed three million gallons of cyanide-laced wastewater into soil and groundwater in 2016, affected Indigenous communities’ calls for accountability went largely unanswered."

"Sean Donahue’s nomination to lead the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of General Counsel advanced on a party-line vote despite Donahue lacking basic legal experience like taking a deposition or drafting a pleading."

"The Trump administration announced it is cutting nearly $4 million in federal funding for climate change research at Princeton University, saying that the work promoted “exaggerated and implausible climate threats” and increased “climate anxiety” among young Americans."

"The White House is ending funding for the body that produces the federal government’s pre-eminent climate report, which summarizes the impacts of rising global temperatures on the United States."

"President Trump issued a sweeping executive order aimed at undermining states’ ability to set their own environmental policies. The order directs Attorney General Pam Bondi to identify and “stop the enforcement” of state laws that address climate change and other environmental initiatives."

"The agrichemical giant is lobbying for state and federal laws that would give it legal immunity from claims that Roundup causes cancer, and launched a new ad blitz."

"The National Weather Service is no longer providing language translations of its products, a change that experts say could put non-English speakers at risk of missing potentially life-saving warnings about extreme weather."

"Citing health concerns, newly appointed Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said this week that he will direct the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to stop recommending that states add fluoride to their water, and will convene a federal taskforce of independent health experts to study the health risks presented by the practice while establishing a new “optimal” level."