Trump EPA officials order scientists at Office of Water to stop publishing research, report says
Scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Water, which ensures drinking water is safe, have been instructed by Trump officials to halt publishing ongoing research in an “unprecedented” move, according to a report.
Staffers at the agency’s research office were summoned to a town hall this week and told that their studies would be subject to a new review process, a change that was ordered by political appointees, the Washington Post reports, citing two agency employees familiar with the matter.
The staffers told the outlet that the type of review was unprecedented and could hamper the release of other important scientific findings affecting public health.
“This represents millions of dollars of research, potentially, that’s now being stopped,” one of the employees told the outlet.
When staff within the Office of Water asked for an explanation they could share with the scientific journals questioning why their papers are on pause, they did not receive a response, according to one of the employees.
Brigit Hirsch, the agency’s press secretary, said that “great scientific work is continuing at the EPA like never before,” but did not share new details about the new review process, the Post reports.
“We are confident EPA has the resources needed to accomplish the agency’s core mission of protecting human health and the environment, fulfill all statutory obligations, and make the best-informed decisions based on the gold standard of science,” Hirsch said in a statement to the outlet.
In June, more than 170 workers at the EPA signed a public letter warning that the agency is no longer living up to its mission to protect human health and the environment. At least eight of them were fired for signing the letter that criticized the agency’s leadership under Administrator Lee Zeldin and President Donald Trump.
Employees at other agencies, including the National Institutes of Health and Federal Emergency Management Agency, have issued similar statements.
And in July, the scientific community sounded the alarm after the Trump administration proposed revoking what’s known as the “endangerment” EPA finding, the concept that climate change is a threat.
The finding underpins many environmental regulations adopted in the U.S. and overturning it could pave the way for cutting a range of rules that limit pollution from cars, power plants and other sources.
In a statement, EPA said the endangerment finding was used by the Obama and Biden administrations to justify “trillions of dollars of greenhouse gas regulations” and that many of the “extremely pessimistic predictions and assumptions EPA relied upon have not materialized as expected.”
The Independent has contacted the EPA for comment.
The Associated Press contributed reporting
