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Climate policies suffering. A horrible, nasty year for the US.
Looking Back at a Historic Year of Dismantling Climate Policies
From the moment President Trump won re-election last year, it was clear that major upheavals were coming for the nation’s climate and energy policies. Few could have predicted just how sweeping the overhauls would be. Here is a partial tally of the major environmental policy moves enacted by the Trump administration.
• On his first day in office, President Trump signed an executive order to withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement, the pact among almost all nations to fight climate change. Weeks later, he said the United States would not be contributing a $4 billion donation to the Green Climate Fund, which helps poor countries adapt to climate change.
• The administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency changed the mission of the agency to focus on promoting economic activity rather than regulating pollution. Since then, the E.P.A. has unleashed changes that have curtailed the government’s ability to limit dangerous pollutants. It moved to repeal a regulation that required coal-burning power plants to cut emissions of mercury, a neurotoxin, and proposed freezing anti-pollution and fuel-efficiency standards for cars, setting up a clash with California, which has set more stringent standards.
• The E.P.A. said it would strip federal protections from millions of acres of wetlands and streams, a move made easier by a recent Supreme Court ruling. The agency also intends to give utilities an additional year to begin cleaning up coal ash landfills, which can leach toxic metals into nearby waterways. And, it said it would delay deadlines to meet drinking water standards for two harmful “forever chemicals” and roll back limits on four other related chemicals.
• Also on his first day in office Trump signed an executive order declaring an “energy emergency” and calling on the government to expand support for fossil fuels while curtailing support for clean energy. Since then, his administration has opened up more than one billion acres of federal lands and waters for oil and gas drilling.
• The E.P.A. has revoked regulations that would have made it more difficult to build natural gas-fired power plants, and the Energy Department has intervened to stop aging coal plants from being shut down. At the same time, Trump and his allies in Congress have repealed subsidies for solar panels, wind turbines and electric vehicles, and government agencies have slowed or stopped federal approvals for new wind and solar projects. All told, companies canceled more than $32 billion in planned clean energy investments in 2025.
• Trump's administration has defunded climate research, erased scientific data and removed terms like “climate change” from federal websites. It closed the independent research arm of the E.P.A. and assigned remaining employees the task of approving the use of new chemicals, and it proposes to erase money for climate science in next year’s budget of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, while eliminating climate laboratories and research on severe storms.
• It slashed funding and staffing for the National Climate Assessment, the federal government’s premier report on how global warming is affecting the country. The administration also said it would break up the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, a world-leading Earth science research institution.
Comment: Based all of that, it's fair to say that Dictator Trump doesn't give a damn about the future of the United States, or even the earth. He and his cronies are taking theirs, and taking it NOW, and screw anyone and everyone else.
Comments
Looking Back at a Historic Year of Dismantling Climate Policies
Comment: Based all of that, it's fair to say that Dictator Trump doesn't give a damn about the future of the United States, or even the earth. He and his cronies are taking theirs, and taking it NOW, and screw anyone and everyone else.
"One step up and two steps back" were lyrics from a Bruce Springsteen song. Not sure we even saw the "one step up" part in 2025.
Horrible stuff for US citizens. Great for aspiring dicktators, though.