"The Department of the Interior will be able to treat members of Congress and the executive branch to free concert tickets under new rules released Tuesday."

"Senate Republicans advanced President Trump's nominee to be the Interior Department's top lawyer on Tuesday over objections from Democrats who called him partisan and unresponsive to ethics questions swirling around the department's secretary and his predecessor." Daniel Jorjani was architect of Interior's proposed policy for rejecting Freedom of Information Act requests.

"Officials in California are crying foul over a Trump administration plan to slash firefighting assistance payments to the state, which could amount to millions of dollars in lost income for fire departments."

"U.S. Senator Michael Bennet, a 2020 Democratic presidential contender, unveiled a plan on Monday to tackle climate change with a focus on slashing emissions from farming and ranching and conserving nearly a third of U.S. lands."

"The Environmental Protection Agency plans to change the way it calculates the health risks of air pollution, a shift that would make it easier to roll back a key climate change rule because it would result in far fewer predicted deaths from pollution, according to five people with knowledge of the agency’s plans."

"Despite repeatedly expressing public support for children's health, EPA is ending funding for a network of research centers focused on environmental threats to kids, imperiling several long-running studies of pollutants' effects on child development."

"DAVENPORT, Iowa — The Mississippi River, which gushed into downtown Davenport at record levels two weeks ago, has finally retreated toward its banks. Left behind: A truck-size hole in the temporary flood barrier, dead fish on mud-caked Pershing Avenue, and an urgent conversation about how to shield the city from the next flood."

"New York’s Suffolk County had a trash problem. Facing brimming landfills and public pressure, legislators took a first-in-the-nation step: They banned plastic bags. But what the county saw as part of the solution, the plastics industry took as a threat."

"In 40 years of behind-the-scenes advocacy for electric companies, the Utility Air Regulatory Group became ubiquitous in legal dockets and courtroom fights over the future of federal regulation. The group, which last week announced plans to disband, led the charge against dozens of EPA policies deemed too costly or unworkable by industry."

"More than a dozen states are moving to strengthen environmental protections to combat a range of issues from climate change to water pollution, opening a widening rift between stringent state policies and the Trump administration’s deregulatory agenda."