{"id":7007,"date":"2025-04-03T03:46:29","date_gmt":"2025-04-03T03:46:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/?p=7007"},"modified":"2025-04-16T05:02:40","modified_gmt":"2025-04-16T05:02:40","slug":"trumps-epa-is-at-war-with-the-americans-it-is-supposed-to-protect","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/?p=7007","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s EPA Is at War With the Americans It Is Supposed to Protect"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>by\u00a0<span class=\"author vcard\"><a class=\"url fn n\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtoninformer.com\/author\/ben-jealous\/\">Ben Jealous<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p>As they say in horror movies, the call is coming from inside the house.<\/p>\n<p>Under Donald Trump, the Environmental Protection Agency has reversed its own mission. And last week, EPA administrator Lee Zeldin outright declared war on the American people.<\/p>\n<p>Zeldin announced 31 actions he celebrated as \u201cthe largest deregulatory announcement in U.S. history.\u201d The administration is attempting to undo critical progress that is currently saving lives and saving Americans\u2019 money \u2014 on health care costs, energy bills and more. Moreover, Trump and Zeldin are trying to undercut the EPA\u2019s very ability to do its job and protect our health, our communities and our futures.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-1    \">\n<div class=\"newspack_global_ad scaip-1 fixed-height\">\n<div id=\"div-gpt-ad-caf9af3267-0\">If Trump and Zeldin are successful in undoing the rules they have targeted, the consequences are guaranteed to be dire. Dire for the thousands of Americans who will die needlessly every year. Dire for the thousands of children who spend more days in the hospital and fewer days in school. Dire for working families whose electricity and health care bills will go up, and whose air and water will become the things that are killing them rather than keeping them alive.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Dire for the tens of millions of American children and adults living with asthma \u2014 like Kyla Peck, whom I spoke with last World Asthma Day. Kyla recalled her first rude awakening with how poor air quality was not just a threat to her daily physical well-being but also her bank account:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was home in Chicago from college, maybe 20 years old, and I had a really, really bad asthma attack. I was hospitalized for maybe about 12 hours. Then I received the bill. Even after insurance paid their part, I owed about $500. I was in college; I had no money. \u2026 It was stressful, not only having to navigate the asthma attack but having to learn to navigate my own financial situation living with this illness.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Now let us look at just one of the rules under attack by the Trump administration that are helping people like Kyla every day. Just over a year ago, when the EPA was fulfilling its mission, it finalized improved air quality standards. At the time, the agency estimated that, come 2032, that one rule alone would \u201cprevent up to 4,500 premature deaths and 290,000 lost workdays, yielding up to $46 billion in net health benefits;\u201d that in that year, for every dollar spent from that rule, \u201cthere could be as much as $77 in human health benefits.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Announcing that rule back in February 2024, then-EPA Administrator Michael Regan said, \u201cCleaner air means that our children have brighter futures, and people can live more productive and active lives.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-2    \">\n<div class=\"newspack_global_ad scaip-2 fixed-height\">\n<div id=\"div-gpt-ad-2bd992b9b0-0\">It is pretty hard to argue with that statement \u2026 unless you are not bothered by your actions killing Americans and making their lives worse. And that is exactly what we are seeing with this presidential administration. What a difference a year makes.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Among Zeldin\u2019s 31 actions is doing away with the EPA\u2019s own 2009 finding that planet-warming greenhouse gas pollution \u201cthreatens the public health and welfare of current and future generations.\u201d That finding has been the underpinning of years of EPA actions that have protected Americans, saved countless lives and made it possible for us to combat the climate crisis on multiple fronts.<\/p>\n<p>This week we celebrate three global days of recognition meant to highlight the importance and urgency of protecting our environment \u2014 for the sake of both nature and mankind. This Friday is the International Day of Forests, highlighting how forests and trees \u201cfuel food security, support livelihoods, and sustain our planet.\u201d Saturday is World Water Day, with a theme this year of fighting the climate crisis to mitigate the devastation of our rapidly melting glaciers. And Sunday is World Meteorological Day, with this year\u2019s theme focused on the importance of early warning systems in reducing the harm of climate-driven extreme weather events. These three days all highlight areas in which the Trump administration is decimating America\u2019s leadership and gutting our own government\u2019s ability to address threats \u2014 including the administration\u2019s mass firings and reckless budget slashing at agencies like the U.S. Forest Service (which helps lead U.S. efforts to combat wildfires) and the National Weather Service.<\/p>\n<p>With last week\u2019s move by the EPA, it is sadly ironic that the Trump administration\u2019s efforts to undermine science, common sense, climate resilience and public health are coming to a crescendo \u2014 so far \u2014 right as the world turns its attention to the necessity of environmental protection. Americans will not take these attacks lying down. We are \u2014 and will keep \u2014 fighting back.<\/p>\n<p><em>Ben Jealous is the executive director of the Sierra Club and a professor of practice at the University of Pennsylvania.<\/em><\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-3    \">\n<div class=\"newspack_global_ad scaip-3 fixed-height\">\n<div id=\"div-gpt-ad-dc2e0e383b-0\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<aside>\n<div id=\"id_1226884\" class=\"newspack-popup-container newspack-popup newspack-inline-popup\" tabindex=\"0\" role=\"button\" data-segments=\"\" data-frequency=\"0,0,0,month\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-group\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-container-core-group-is-layout-2 wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">Source: Published without changes from Washington Informer Newspaper<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by\u00a0Ben Jealous As they say in horror movies, the call is coming from inside the house. Under Donald<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7008,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[255,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-america-under-attack","category-regular-column"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7007"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7007\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7009,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7007\/revisions\/7009"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}