Trump’s EPA Plans to Reconsider Finding That Climate Pollution Harms Public Health

The Trump administration plans to reconsider an official finding by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from 2009 that greenhouse gases harm public health.

The “endangerment finding” for greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act forms the foundation of the country’s climate regulations.

“I’ve been told the endangerment finding is considered the holy grail of the climate change religion,” said EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, as Inside Climate News reported. “For me, the U.S. Constitution and the laws of this nation will be strictly interpreted and followed, no exceptions. Today, the green new scam ends.”

During his confirmation hearing, Zeldin acknowledged the threats caused by sea level rise and climate change, but has been viewed as backtracking on his promise to “respect the science and listen to the experts.”

The announcement was part of dozens of environmental regulation rollbacks made public by Zeldin on Wednesday.

The 2009 endangerment finding followed a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that the EPA had the authority to regulate greenhouse gases and is the basis for all pollution reduction rules, reported The Guardian.

Zeldin said the EPA would reconsider the finding over concerns that it had resulted in “an agenda that throttles our industries, our mobility, and our consumer choice while benefiting adversaries overseas.”

Since its creation in 1970, the EPA’s main mission has been to protect public health and the environment.

Zeldin is rewriting that mission, saying the aim of the rollbacks is to “lower the cost of buying a car, heating a home and running a business.”

Zeldin called it the “most consequential day of deregulation in American history,” adding that “we are driving a dagger through the heart of climate-change religion and ushering in America’s Golden Age.”

Environmentalists denounced the EPA’s plans and promised to defend scientific findings, as well as the country’s ability to tackle climate change through the court system.

“The Trump administration’s ignorance is trumped only by its malice toward the planet,” said Jason Rylander, legal director of the Climate Law Institute at the Center for Biological Diversity, as The Guardian reported. “Come hell or high water, raging fires and deadly heatwaves, Trump and his cronies are bent on putting polluter profits ahead of people’s lives. This move won’t stand up in court. We’re going to fight it every step of the way.”

Pollution from cars, power plants and industry causes many health problems, while greenhouse gases are responsible for the global heating that fuels disastrous heat waves, wildfires, storms and flooding, among other impacts.

“Zeldin’s EPA is dragging America back to the days before the Clean Air Act, when people were dying from pollution,” said Dominique Browning, director of Moms Clean Air Force. “This is unacceptable. And shameful. We will oppose with all our hearts to protect our children from this cruel, monstrous action.”

Gina McCarthy, EPA administrator during the Obama administration, called Wednesday “the most disastrous day in EPA history.”

“Rolling these rules back is not just a disgrace, it’s a threat to all of us. The agency has fully abdicated its mission to protect Americans’ health and wellbeing,” McCarthy said.