Fringe fearmongering now mainstream for GOP candidates in New Jersey

MAGA hats: Trump campaign swag or symbols of hate?

Republican primary challengers embrace election lies, COVID-19 conspiracies, and more

By JEFF PILLETS NJ Spotlight

John Barker, a U.S. Army veteran running for the Republican nomination in New Jersey’s 2nd Congressional District, wants you to believe what would be shocking news: Vladimir Putin’s bombing targets in Ukraine are really money-laundering sites used by Hillary Clinton and President Joe Biden.

Barker also endorses the idea that global warming is a fraud and that the Super Bowl’s rap-heavy half-time show is proof of America’s decline.

Rhetoric like this, usually the province of fringe candidates, is all over New Jersey this spring as dozens of hopeful Republican candidates appeal to a GOP base that’s on a roll and now looking to win in New Jersey.

New Jersey Spotlight News surveyed social media posts and campaign releases of some three dozen Republicans in all 12 of the state’s congressional districts.

The review shows that, on the surface, the GOP candidates portray themselves as traditional conservatives with big plans to lower taxes, limit government and expand what they view as personal freedom. Photos of Ronald Reagan and odes to the Second Amendment stream across their websites. 

MAGA again

But this year, that traditional message is being drowned out by conservative clamor around social and identity issues. Many Republican campaigns are all about “saving America” from what they call evils like mask mandates, mail-in ballots, trans athletes and the demands of Black Lives Matter.

If candidates’ social media are a gauge, the Republican wave has arrived in New Jersey with a strong undercurrent of “Make America Great Again” zealotry, conspiracy chatter, misinformation, and race-based dog-whistling.

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On Capitol Hill, advancing rural recycling and exploring a national composting strategy

Getty Images

By Megan Quinn Waste Dive

UPDATE: April 7, 2022: The Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works voted favorably to report the Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act (S.3742) and the Recycling and Composting Accountability Act (S.3743) on Thursday. The first bill in particular has seen widespread recycling industry support.

“I think they’re a product of the best of our committee’s tradition of working together on conservation and sustainability issues,” said Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., who chairs the committee.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., said she hopes the legislation could help make recycling “more effective,” as, in her opinion, “the opportunities for recycling kind of ebb and flow because, economically, it hasn’t been a winner for our counties or our states or our cities.”

Dive Brief:

  • Feb. 3: The Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works previewed two bills meant to expand on broad national recycling and waste reduction goals at a hearing Wednesday. 
     
  • The draft Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act, led by Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., would direct the U.S. EPA to provide grants between $1 million and $15 million each for projects that make recycling programs more accessible to rural and disadvantaged communities, specifically hub-and-spoke recycling systems featuring transfer stations, and those that leverage public-private partnerships. 
  • The draft Recycling and Composting Accountability Act, led by Sens. Tom Carper, D-Del., and John Boozman, R-Ark., would direct EPA to collect a wide array of recycling and composting data, including inventories of MRFs and curbside collection programs, and “explore opportunities” for implementing a national composting strategy.

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NJ wants chemical companies to pay for groundwater pollution in Bergen County

The Latest ‘Natural Resource Damage’ lawsuit cites the impact on an environmental justice community

By JON HURDLE NJ Spotlight

New Jersey sued two chemical companies, saying they polluted groundwater with toxic chemicals at a Bergen County site over decades, and must now compensate the public for their loss of a natural resource, as well as the state for its cleanup costs.

The Department of Environmental Protection and the Attorney General’s Office filed a lawsuit against Hexcel Corp., now based in Connecticut, and Clifton-based Fine Organics Corp., formerly a division of Hexcel, claiming the companies tainted groundwater at the Lodi site with volatile organic compounds, PCBs and petroleum products.

Overburdened community under Environmental Justice law

The location adjoins a community classified as “overburdened” under New Jersey’s Environmental Justice law, and was affected by pollution from the two companies, according to the complaint.

Even though the site has been cleaned up since the companies stopped operating there in 1998, the agencies are now seeking compensation for the lost value of groundwater and for the expenses incurred by the DEP in investigating and removing contaminated soil and water.

“The Murphy administration is committed to making polluters pay for the damage they have caused, and to addressing environmental injustices visited for decades upon New Jersey’s minority and low-income communities,” acting Attorney General Matthew Platkin said in a statement.

Consequences for public health

The surrounding community has been exposed for years to higher levels of water, air, soil, and noise pollution than the state as a whole, and has suffered the consequences to public health, according to the 36-page complaint, filed in Superior Court on Monday.

Hexcel declined to comment on a matter that’s in litigation; Fine Organics did not respond to a request for comment.

Read the full story here

If you liked this post you’ll love our daily newsletter, EnviroPolitics. It’s packed with the latest news, commentary, and legislative updates from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Delaware…and beyond. Don’t take our word for it, try it free for an entire month. No obligation.

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EPA plans to remove landfill in Delaware from Superfund designation

From the Environmental Protection Agency

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced today that it has proposed deleting a portion of the Tybouts Corner Landfill in New Castle, Delaware, from the Superfund National Priorities List (NPL). The NPL is a list of the nation’s most contaminated hazardous waste sites.

EPA deletes sites or parts of sites from the NPL when no further cleanup is required to protect human health or the environment. Years, and sometimes decades, of complex investigation and cleanup work have gone into getting these sites to the point where they can be deleted from the NPL.

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“Deleting sites from the NPL is a major milestone for Superfund impacted communities,” said EPA Mid-Atlantic Regional Administrator Adam Ortiz.  “An NPL deletion, and even a portion of a site, signals that cleanup is complete and the site no longer poses a threat to public health and the environment.”

The Tybouts Corner Landfill Site is in New Castle County, Delaware, approximately 10 miles south of Wilmington and four miles west of the Delaware River. The site was used by the New Castle County Department of Public Works as a municipal sanitary landfill which accepted industrial wastes from December 1968 until July 1971. The landfill consisted of two non-adjoined sections, a West Landfill that was about four acres in size and the Main Landfill that was about 47 acres, with waste ranging from five to 40 feet thick. Contamination was found in two nearby wells in 1976 and again in 1983.

The site is being addressed through federal and Potentially Responsible Party (PRP) actions.  Based on cleanup activities, soil and groundwater monitoring data and no existing waste remaining on site, EPA has determined that actions are complete for the two parcels on Tybouts Corner Landfill and have been proposed for partial deletion from the NPL.

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“Buffer in a Bag” program provides free seedlings to curb erosion of rivers and streams

site at honeoye wildlife management area in fall 2017
From the New York Department of Environmental Conservation

Qualifying private and public landowners may apply for a free bag of 25 tree and shrub seedlings for planting near streams, rivers, or lakes to help stabilize banks, protect water quality, and improve wildlife habitat.

To qualify, landowners must have property in New York State with at least 50 feet bordering a stream, river, or lake, and provide photos or a map of the planting location.

We encourage previous recipients to reapply to continue to build riparian buffers.

The state’s Department of Environmental Conservation will choose recipients on a first-come, first-served basis. Applications are due by 3 p.m. on April 11, 2022.

Contact treesfortribs@dec.ny.gov with questions, and visit DEC’s Trees for Tribs webpage to learn more.

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NY judge strikes Democratic-drawn maps

By Colby Itkowitz Washington Post

A New York judge on Thursday struck down the state’s new congressional and legislative maps as defying a voter-backed constitutional amendment that aimed to end partisan gerrymandering, dealing a blow to Democrats hoping to hold onto their fragile majority in the House this November.

State Supreme Court Judge Patrick McAllister in Steuben County ordered the state legislature to draw bipartisan maps by April 11 or the court will appoint an independent map drawer to do it. The state will appeal the decision, triggering an automatic stay until the state appeals court takes it up.

New York Democrats drew a new congressional map with boundaries that could gain their party as many as three new seats, a crucial advantage at a time when the House majority will come down to just a handful of wins.

How redistricting is shaping the 2022 U.S. House map

The judge’s order was the latest redistricting disappointment Democrats have faced in recent weeks after what had been several initial legal wins. A Maryland judge invalidated a Democratic-drawn congressional map, the U.S. Supreme Court threw out Wisconsin court-approved legislative maps that added a new majority-Black district, and an Ohio map that heavily favored Republicans, thrown out by the state Supreme Court, is now expected to remain in place for 2022.

How redistricting is shaping the 2022 U.S. House map

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