EPA workers write open letter warning of Trump's devastating impact
Environmental Protection Agency employees penned an open letter to the American public raising the alarm on President Donald Trump’s dismantling of their agency.
“We cannot stand by and allow this to happen,” the workers demanded in an Environmental Health News op-ed. “We need to hold this administration accountable to serving the American people, applying the same mandates that we have held our federal workforce and grant recipients to: follow the law, follow the science, and be transparent.”
According to the current and former workers who wrote the letter, the funding cuts—some of which were done under the guise of ending diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives—have slashed projects that monitored air pollution and clean drinking water in vulnerable communities.
Many of these projects already received the stamp of approval from Congress and have been cleared in the budget, but the Trump’s administration is refusing to pay up. Now, projects that solely relied on government funding are coming to a screeching halt.
“Some grant recipients who have lost access to EPA funding had already been working for more than a year on projects that must now be paused,” the letter said.
They then laid out how Trump’s actions are fraudulent and unconstitutional.
“It is a waste of taxpayer dollars for the U.S. Government to cancel its agreements with grantees and contractors. It is fraud for the U.S. Government to delay payments for services already received And it is an abuse of power for the Trump administration to block the IRA laws that were mandated by Congress,” they said.
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin hasn’t exactly been on his agency’s side either. Last week, he slashed his workforce by 150 employees, and he’s planning to fire more than 1,100 scientists.
These firings have already received backlash from Democrats, including Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California, who called Zeldin’s firings “illegal” and a blatant attempt to dismantle the EPA’s ability to function.
“Every decision EPA makes must be in furtherance of protecting human health and the environment, and that just can’t happen if you gut EPA science,” Lofgren said in a statement provided to Daily Kos.
And while Zeldin is penning diatribes in the Wall Street Journal bragging about shooting a “dagger through the heart of climate change religion,” his employees are sharing a different message.
“This is not about defending our paychecks,” they said. “This is about protecting the health of our communities.”
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