By Alliance President Terry Gips
Whether you’re a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Independent or Green, we need to come together to stop the violation of our bedrock environmental laws, Constitution and democratic principles under the reign of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk.
This is no longer a partisan issue but an urgent S.O.S. for all people who care about our country and planet. Climate action and DEI by this administration are gone and LGBTQ and birthright citizenship rights are challenged.
While military funding is increased, Musk and DOGE are chainsawing federal agencies and workers who assure basic government services. Significant cuts and layoffs are being made with everything from VA Hospitals and National Parks to education and disease prevention. Even Medicaid is on the possible chopping block.
Stunning EPA Environmental Rollbacks and Business Benefits Critiqued
On March 12 EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin proudly issued the historic rollback of 31 landmark environmental regulations, thereby gutting rules on pollution from coal-fired power plants, climate change and electric vehicles. He said, “We are driving a dagger through the heart of climate-change religion” and proclaimed it the “most consequential day of deregulation in American history,” as cited by the AP.
Former Republican EPA Administrator and NJ Governor Christine Todd Whitman told the PBS NewsHour that these policies are “endangering the life and health of every American.”
Whitman pointed out that the EPA has let go most of the enforcement that assures utilities and plants are meeting their requirements under the Safe Air, Water and Drinking Water Acts. However, she feels it will take years to undue regulations because they’re based on scientific data so they can’t just be rolled back.
But Whitman warned, “When you don’t have enforcement, the companies will go right ahead doing what they’ve been doing because it makes more money for them. That’s what this is all about. It’s all about money, for frankly the very wealthy who run these companies and are benefitting from this. They love it.”
The EPA Ends Environmental Justice
Zeldin announced the closure of all 11 environmental justice offices addressing polluting plants in poor and minority communities facing high cancer and asthma rates. He termed them “Forced discrimination programs” and said they were “an excuse to fund left-wing activists.”
This followed Zeldin’s decision last week to drop a case against a Louisiana petrochemical plant accused of increasing cancer risk in a majority-Black community. Former EPA environmental justice office head Matthew Tejada said Trump and Zeldin were “taking us back to a time of unfettered pollution across the nation, leaving every American exposed to toxic chemicals, dirty air and contaminated water.”
The EPA Undermines America’s Commitment to Addressing the Climate Crisis
Zeldin and Trump support rewriting the agency’s 2009 finding that planet-warming greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare. The Obama-era determination under the Clean Air Act provides the legal basis for climate regulations for motor vehicles, power plants and other pollution sources.
Zeldin also says the EPA will rewrite a rule restricting air pollution from fossil-fuel fired power plants and a separate measure restricting emissions from cars and trucks, which Zeldin and Trump falsely label as an electric vehicle “mandate.”
The EPA Wants to End Clean Air, Water and Drinking Water Protections
The EPA is also ending restrictions on industrial pollution of mercury and other air toxins, soot pollution and a “good neighbor” rule intended to restrict smokestack emissions burdening downwind areas with smog.
It is also targeting a clean water law that provides federal protections for rivers, streams and wetlands.
Environmental groups are up in arms, vowing to oppose the actions. Environmental Defense Fund Executive Director Amanda Leland said the EPA actions were an “unlawful attack on the public health of the American people” and would result in “the greatest increase in pollution in decades” in the US.
Jason Rylander, legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute said, “Come hell and high water, raging fires and deadly heatwaves, Trump and his cronies are bent on putting polluter profits ahead of people’s lives.”
Trump Administration Allows Conflicts of Interest and Tariffs to Run Wild
Big, unethical, conflicts of interest and insider dealing are happening behind closed doors and in plain sight, with all government watchdogs fired. The real game is that huge government contracts on AI and much more are up for grabs among billionaires, like Bezos and Zuckerberg. But don’t worry, Elon the Fox is guarding the hen house.
We must fight for sustainability by opposing Trump’s inflation-boosting tariffs that are triggering counter-tariffs from our allies. The tariffs are tanking the US and world economies, stock market and farm prices, increasing the probability of recession and massive layoffs.
Economist and former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers calls them “a self-inflicted wound on the American economy”. Even the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board slammed Trump’s tariffs as the “dumbest tariff plunge.”
War on the Media, Nonprofits and the Arts
We can’t forget another arm of Trump’s attack, the media. Musk now controls Twitter (no I won’t call it X) and uses it for official government announcements, along with Trump’s Truth Social. Trump has gotten media moguls like Mark Zuckerberg to end fact-checking while already silencing much of mainstream media through his lawsuits.
Of course, two of his prime targets are NPR and Public Television because they actually provide real news. By labelling them as “woke,” he can conveniently eliminate key sources of news so Truth Social and Fox and Friends can be unfettered.
But leaving no stone unturned in his scorched earth policy, Trump has gone after the arts (like the Kennedy Center) and launched a wholesale attack on nonprofits, big and small. The Journal of Philanthropy is fortunately and bravely reporting about this nearly every day.
Thanks to Our Courts and No Thanks to Republican Profiles in Cowardice
Fortunately, for now anyway, courts have so far blocked two-thirds of Trump’s actions. Both Democratic and Republican-appointed judges are calling the administration’s actions either unconstitutional or a violation of separation of powers.
But there’s a serious and dangerous question as to whether Trump will violate Court orders and refuse to follow the law.
Meanwhile, we need to rise up and pressure our elected officials to do their constitutional duty to assure the laws they passed are followed.
Budget Cuts for the Poor, Tax Cuts for the Rich and Booming Debt for All
We also need to call out the administration’s proposed $1.7 trillion in harsh spending cuts, which are being done to reward Trump’s wealthy supporters with a $4.5 trillion tax cut. The rich will get richer while low-income and middle class Americans struggle to pay their bills and put food on the table.
But surprise! Instead of keeping their promise to lower the Nation’s debt, these actions will make it skyrocket by $6 trillion over 10 years, according to Trump’s business school, the Warton School at the U of Pennsylvania. So much for all the pledges of all those deficit hawks.
Stop the Bullying and True Traitors
At the same time, we need to stand up to bullying Trump and Musk as they viciously attack military leaders and elected officials, including the President of Ukraine and Canadian Prime Minister. Musk called former Naval fighter pilot and US Sen. Mark Kelly a “traitor” just for visiting Ukraine.
Actually, by most definitions, it would be Musk who should wear the label for cozying up to our sworn enemy Putin and the extremist right-wing party in Germany.
Allies Are Not Ours for the Taking or Ridiculing
Meanwhile, Trump wants to violate national sovereignty and take over our allies Canada, Mexico, Greenland and the Panama Canal. He’s renamed the Gulf of Mexico and Trump will continue to test the waters, expanding his power to see if anyone is willing to stand up to him.
Trump lauds violent dictator Putin as a model while denigrating Ukraine’s brave fighters and our allies in Europe who are under threat of invasion by Russia. He’s pushing to end NATO commitments and security protections for our European partners.
Those actions, plus the tariffs, are making Europeans recognize they are no longer allied with the US and now have to cut back social spending to build their military. They’re even forcing Germany to re-evaluate its commitment to not having nuclear weapons, contributing to nuclear proliferation.
Speaking of Germany, you don’t have to be Jewish to know the history of how dictators come to power. Will we ever learn? I say, Never Again! Please join us in co-creating a future of sustainability, health, equity and kindness.