EPA and the Justice Department for over two years sought to build a case that pollution from a Louisiana synthetic rubber plant posed an “imminent” peril to nearby residents in a predominantly Black area.
In now abandoning that case, Trump administration officials underscored that they have no intention of directly confronting the well-documented reality that people of color and low-income communities are disproportionately exposed to tainted air, water and soil.
“While EPA’s core mission includes securing clean air for all Americans, we can fulfill that mission within well-established legal frameworks, without stretching the bounds of the law or improperly implementing so-called ‘environmental justice,’” agency Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a news release issued late Friday.
The release said the move to drop the case aligns with “Zeldin’s pledge to end the use of ‘environmental justice’ as a tool for advancing ideological priorities.”
