In a Capitol Hill hearing, Christie Whitman and others urged Congress to provide stronger oversight of the Trump EPA and raised concerns about the agency’s ties to industries it regulates.
BY NINA PULLANO for Inside Climate News
JUN 11, 2019
Three former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrators who served under Republican presidents urged Congress to ramp up its oversight of the Trump EPA on Tuesday, expressing distress at the agency’s attempts to mislead the public on the risks of climate change and brush aside science in decision-making.
They were joined by Democrat Gina McCarthy, the agency’s chief under President Barack Obama, illustrating that these are bipartisan sentiments.
“I find it disconcerting,” McCarthy told a congressional hearing, that “this collection of past EPA Administrators feel obligated to testify together and individually to make the case that what is happening at EPA today is, simply put, not normal, and to solicit your help to get it on a more productive path.”
Lee M. Thomas, who served under President Ronald Reagan as EPA administrator from 1985 to 1989 before becoming a business executive, questioned whether EPA is fulfilling its mission.
“Does the Agency have adequate resources with the strong scientific capability it needs? Is it seeking input form key scientific advisory committees? Is it coordinating actively with the broad scientific community on research surrounding environmental issues? I don’t think they do,” he wrote in his testimony for the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s subcommittee on oversight and investigations.
All of the former administrators stressed that the current EPA needs clear direction from Congress and a return to the bipartisan support and adherence to science that bolstered the agency in the past, when major environmental legislation would pass with overwhelming margins.
Each had been involved in regulations that President Donald Trump’s administration is now trying to dismantle.
William K. Reilly was administrator under George H.W. Bush when the Clean Air Act was reauthorized and rules for ozone-depleting chemicals and toxic emissions were added. The Clean Air Act has been a frequent target of Trump administration attempts to roll back pollution regulations.
“Our country continues to face serious challenges in protecting public health and natural resources,” Reilly said, naming climate change and building community resiliency to address the impacts of extreme weather events, coastal erosion and sea level rise, among other challenges. He has criticized Trump’s decision to pull the U.S. out of the Paris climate agreement.
“These challenges require an EPA that is strong, credible, and sufficiently resourced to conduct and sponsor timely research and risk assessments,” he said.
Christine Todd Whitman, EPA administrator under George W. Bush from 2001 to 2003, also talked about her growing concerns about the impact of climate change, particularly on the ocean that borders her home state of New Jersey, and about the risks to human health from pollution.
Whitman listed several “egregious actions” by the Trump EPA, including its plans to roll back vehicle emissions standards, repeal methane emissions from oil and gas operations, and relax regulations on toxic air pollution.
At the same time, she noted, it has been replacing scientists on its Science Advisory Board with industry representatives and trying to formally restrict the scientific evidence EPA can use in policy making.
The Trump administration is “using ideology to drive environmental policy instead of letting science drive policy,” Whitman said.
