Trump EPA Shutters Environmental Justice Offices, Cancels Grants

The Trump Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) moved to cancel $2 billion in grants to help communities burdened by pollution and will shutter every environmental justice office nationwide, according to published reports.

The following is a reaction by Matthew Tejada, Senior Vice President for Environmental Health at NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council). Prior to joining NRDC, Tejada led EPA’s environmental justice office.

“Trump’s EPA is 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 grants that EPA moved to cancel are some of the most important to help make communities across the nation safer, healthier, and more prosperous. They are helping rural Virginia coal communities prepare for extreme flooding, installing sewage systems on rural Alabama homes, and turning an abandoned, polluted site in Tampa, Florida into a campus for healthcare, job training, and a small business development.

“Those who have paid the highest price for pollution, with their health, are now the first to be sacrificed by Trump’s EPA. But they will not be the last. Every American should be worried about what this portends. We are witnessing the first step of removing environmental protections from everyone, as the chemical industry and fossil fuel producers get their way – and the rest of us will pay with our health and lost legal rights.”