"WASHINGTON — At least 60 percent of U.S. Superfund sites are in areas vulnerable to flooding or other worsening disasters of climate change, and the Trump administration’s reluctance to directly acknowledge global warming is deterring efforts to safeguard them, a congressional watchdog agency says.

In a report being released later Monday, the Government Accountability Office called on Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Andrew Wheeler to state directly that dealing with the rising risks of seas, storms or wildfires breaching Superfund sites under climate change is part of the agency’s mission.

The findings emphasize the challenges for government agencies under President Donald Trump, who frequently mocks scientists’ urgent warnings on global heating. Wheeler’s highest-profile public remarks on the matter came in a March CBS interview, when he called global heating “an important change” but not one of the agency’s most pressing problems."

Ellen Knickmeyer reports for the Associated Press November 18, 2019. [2]