Trump Touts Environmental Record After Rolling Back Protections
Trump to Tout Environmental Record After Aggressively Rolling Back Climate Rules
(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump on Monday boasted the U.S. is ranked No. 1 for access to clean drinking water as he emphasized American environmental gains despite seeking to roll back rules meant to preserve them.
“From day one, my administration has made it a top priority to ensure America has the cleanest air and water in the planet,” Trump said to conservative advocates assembled in the the East Room of the White House.
Trump rattled off an array of achievements, including reductions in conventional air pollution, the cleanup of toxic Superfund sites and efforts to combat algae blooms in Florida.
Trump’s address on “America’s environmental leadership” came as polls show voters increasingly concerned about global warming and unhappy with the president’s approach to the issue. Just 29% of voters in a Washington Post-ABC News telephone survey released Monday said they approved of the way Trump is handling climate change.
As the effects of climate change become more apparent in the form of catastrophic hurricanes, floods, droughts and wildfires, Trump’s environmental agenda has focused chiefly on rewriting Obama-era rules limiting greenhouse gas emissions -- not imposing aggressive new mandates that would keep global warming in check.
Environmental advocates called the episode surreal. “It must be opposite day at the White House,” quipped Dan Lashof, U.S. director of the World Resources Institute.
Jill Tauber, vice president of litigation, climate and energy at Earthjustice, said it was “absurd for President Trump to claim any environmental credentials when his administration continues to drive a destructive pro-polluter agenda at the expense of the American people.”
Democratic opponents have criticized the president’s record and are competing to outdo each other with proposals for throttling heat-warming carbon dioxide emissions. During two days of presidential debates last month, the candidates cast Trump as retreating from an urgent global fight to prevent the most catastrophic consequences of climate change. Almost all of the Democratic presidential candidates have pledged to rejoin the Paris climate accord -- or strengthen U.S. greenhouse-gas-cutting commitments. And Washington Governor Jay Inslee has made the issue the centerpiece of his bid for the White House.
Critics cast Trump’s speech as a failed effort to rehab his image, with Tiernan Sittenfeld, senior vice president of government affairs at League of Conservation Voters, calling it “a made-for-TV moment from our made-for-TV president trying to make up for some bad poll numbers on his environmental record.”
But Trump -- contrasting his record with his predecessor’s -- said he’s managed to protect the environment without destroying jobs.
“A strong economy is vital to maintaining a healthy environment,” he said.
Indeed, the U.S. has made strides cleaning up its air and water have since the 1970s, after a series of environmental disasters -- an oil spill off the California coast, toxic pollution emanating from New York’s Love Canal and Ohio’s Cuyahoga River bursting into flames -- spurred anti-pollution laws and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency.
Conventional criteria air pollution has dropped 73% from 1970 to 2017, even though the economy grew more than 260% in the same time. And while 40% of U.S. water systems failed to meet drinking water standards in 1970, more than 90% do today, EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said Monday.
Yet environmental advocates say those gains were driven by decades-old federal clean air and water laws that Trump is now undermining. The administration’s overhaul of former President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan -- replacing sweeping power-plant pollution curbs for modest efficiency improvements at the sites -- was published in the government’s Federal Register on Monday.
In fact, carbon dioxide emissions that drive climate change just increased, after generally falling since 2005. There was a 2.7% hike in greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion in 2018, the second-largest annual increase since 2000, according to a report from the Rhodium Group LLC. And economy wide, greenhouse gas emissions likely rose between 1.5% and 2.5% last year -- putting U.S. emissions at 10.7% to 11.6% below 2005 levels, a common benchmark.
Trump’s environmental record is nothing to boast about, said Collin O’Mara, president of the National Wildlife Federation. “Actions speak louder than words -- and for the past 900 days this administration has repeatedly acted to allow more mercury, smog and carbon pollution into our air, more nutrient and sediment pollution into our waterways, and more destruction of essential wildlife habitat in our treasured natural places,” he said by email.
Trump made revamping environmental regulation a signature issue on the campaign trail and rapidly moved to fulfill those promises once in the White House. He directed the Interior Department to resume selling coal on federal land, ending a moratorium imposed under Obama. His administration began easing limits on oil well releases of methane, a super-potent greenhouse gas. Trump promised the U.S. would abandon the Paris climate accord -- a global pact to cut emissions. And the Trump administration has proposed freezing vehicle emission and fuel economy standards at 2020 levels, preventing planned increases that had been set in motion under Obama.
Under Trump, political appointees have overruled concerns from EPA experts, revamped scientific advisory panels and moved to discount the health benefits of cleaning up some air pollution.
Trump administration officials and supporters emphasize that the U.S. can make environmental progress without the heavy hand of government. And they have asserted that the administration’s regulatory changes will unleash private sector innovation, allowing both the U.S. economy and environment to thrive.
“President Trump has shown true leadership on the environment from day one,” said Mandy Gunasekara, a former deputy assistant administrator at the EPA. “He strategically focused his administrative resources toward addressing tangible environmental issues with practical solutions so all our nation’s citizens can enjoy access to the cleanest air and safest drinking water.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Jennifer A. Dlouhy in Washington at jdlouhy1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jon Morgan at jmorgan97@bloomberg.net, Elizabeth Wasserman
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