Message of the Week

February 11, 2019

Acting Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Andrew Wheeler continues to carry out a toxic agenda that undermines the agency’s mission to protect our health and environment. Americans are counting on the U.S. Senate to protect our children and families and reject Wheeler’s nomination to permanently lead the EPA.

 

• Last week, Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler - a former coal lobbyist - moved forward with a potentially deadly proposal, which would dismantle lifesaving mercury pollution standards that protect children and pregnant women from toxicheavy metal poisoning released by power plants.
• Mercury is a potent neurotoxin that can cause permanent neurological damage to infants, and babies exposed to mercury in the womb suffer long-term impacts on their memory, cognitive functioning, language, and fine motor skills.
• On top of exposing more communities to poisonous mercury, Wheeler is putting Americans’ drinking water at risk, by refusing to set limits for a class of chemicals known as PFAS, which is found in the drinking water of 110 million Americans, particularly those living on or near military bases.
• EPA’s own science has shown that PFAS chemicals are linked to severe health impacts like cancer, thyroid disease, and weakened childhood immunity.
• What’s more, EPA enforcement of dirty polluters has dropped sharply since the start of the Trump administration. A recent report by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility revealed that since Trump took office, EPA criminal enforcement hit its lowest levels in 30 years, and a new report showed that civil and criminal enforcement continued to drop in 2018.
• But while Wheeler attempts to use his position of power to force through a toxic agenda on behalf of his former clients, lawmakers in the House are stepping up to meet the demand from [STATE DEMONYMS] who support the transition to a clean energy economy and support the safeguards Wheeler is trying to roll back.
• Last week, a bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced a resolution to reduce the carbon pollution that contributes to climate change by moving forward with local clean energy solutions.
• And this week, the House is holding a series of hearings to examine the impacts of climate change on drinking water, public lands, indigenous communities, and more.
• These lawmakers recognize that the transition away from fossil fuels is imminent and that the clean energy economy has already created nearly 3.2 million American jobs in solar, wind, energy efficiency, clean cars, and other clean technologies, according to the Climate Index. And clean energy jobs outnumber fossil fuel jobs in 42 states and the District of Columbia.
• [STATE DEMONYM]s overwhelmingly support the lifesaving protections Wheeler’s trying to dismantle. But since day one at EPA, Wheeler’s shown he’s beholden to his polluter allies, not the communities whose health he’s supposed to be protecting.
• [STATE] is counting on [SENATOR] to listen to [HIS/HER] constituents and vote against his nomination.