Several groups want the Trump administration to take an axe to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
“The Environmental Protection Agency has a 54-year record of overregulation and abuse of the public for political ends,” said the American Energy Institute. “These actions will protect the environment while increasing energy and industrial production, lowering energy costs, reducing consumer costs, eliminating market distortions, and preserving accountability.”
The organization has aligned with the Energy & Environment Legal Institute, Truth in Energy and Climate, and the American Lands Council. These groups say if the Trump administration will adhere to their advice, the U.S. could see a robust economy from the energy sector.
Here are 10 initial actions for the Trump EPA:
1. Freeze all EPA activities pending review. Except for actual environmental emergencies and necessary monitoring, all activity at EPA should be halted pending review for legality, waste, fraud, abuse, and alignment with administration policies and priorities. Prohibit employees from deleting and destroying documents and communications pertaining to agency activities, including those stored in electronic format on government and personal devices.
2. Prohibit EPA staff from communicating about non-emergency EPA activities with outside groups’ staff unless authorized by the new administration. EPA staff should be barred from “resisting” or sabotaging the new administration and its policies without express authorization from the Administrator. Employees should be barred from communicating about agency activities on their personal devices.
3. Terminate all external science advisors. All members of agency external advisory boards should be immediately terminated. The process to re-staff statutorily required external advisory boards should commence immediately.
4. Revise air quality and emissions standards for conventional pollutants. Launch rulemakings to reduce pointlessly burdensome air quality overregulation for fine particulate matter, ozone, nitrogen oxides, and various air toxics tightened during the Biden administration. 5. End the EV mandate and other agency programs for promoting electric vehicles. Repeal greenhouse gas emissions standards for vehicles.
6. End agency participation in the climate hoax. Roll back the various endangerment findings for greenhouse gases. Repeal the power plant rule. Discontinue the use of the “social cost of carbon” metric. End climate-related programs and climate advocacy on agency websites and social media.
7. Reform the Definition of “Waters of the United States” (WOTUS). Restore a clear and limited definition of wetlands regulation that comports with the original and limited intent of the Clean Water Act.
8. Reform EPA Science, Risk Assessment, Risk Communication and Cost-Benefit Analysis. Revise EPA risk assessments and guidelines and regulatory decisions to focus on likely real-world exposures vs. unrealistic worst-case scenarios. Bring transparency to EPA science and risk activities by requiring disclosure of all science policy decisions. Data is required to be used as a basis for regulation and made publicly available during rulemaking. Require cost-benefit analyses based on actual and demonstrable vs. imaginary costs and benefits.
9. Eliminate the Office of Environmental Justice and all environmental justice programs. Eliminate the pointless Office of Environmental Justice and related activities. Poor people need good-paying jobs not community scaremongering.
10. Settle litigation. End litigation that is inconsistent with administration policy. End sue-and-settle activities and reverse sue-and-settle agreements serve as de facto regulations.
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