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New Federal Lead Pipe Rule is Big Step Forward, Replacing Weak Trump Action
Progress on Clean Water and Public Health at Risk in November Election
Today, the Biden-Harris Administration released its final Lead and Copper Rule Improvements to strengthen protections against lead in drinking water, replacing the regulations adopted by the Trump administration. The new rule will require full lead service line replacement in a decade for most communities, lower the action level from 15 ppb to 10 ppb, and protect millions of people from lead exposure from their drinking water.
The rule replaces the Lead and Copper Rule Revisions adopted by the Trump administration that slowed the pace of lead service line replacements. Lead service lines are the main source of lead in drinking water, and the EPA estimates that 9 million homes are still served through these lead lines. No amount of lead is safe.
In response, Mary Grant, Public Water for All Campaign Director at Food & Water Action said:
“We applaud the Biden-Harris administration for strengthening the rule to remove lead from our drinking water. These long-awaited improvements will replace the weak regulation adopted by Donald Trump, and in doing so, will protect millions of people from lasting harm from this dangerous neurotoxin.
“Today’s action is yet another example of the stark difference between the two Presidential candidates. Only Vice President Kamala Harris is serious about the safety of our drinking water. A Trump reelection could reverse progress on safe water.
“We know much more hard work is necessary to truly deliver water justice across the country. We need to ensure that Congress provides the funding necessary to remove these toxic lead pipes, and communities must replace them with a safer alternative — copper, not dirty PVC or CPVC pipes – at no cost to affected households. With the right leadership, we can continue to build toward safe, lead-free water for all.”
Food & Water Watch mobilizes regular people to build political power to move bold and uncompromised solutions to the most pressing food, water, and climate problems of our time. We work to protect people's health, communities, and democracy from the growing destructive power of the most powerful economic interests.
(202) 683-2500LATEST NEWS
EPA Sets 'Landmark' Clean Water Rule—But Trump Victory Would Put It At Risk
The Biden-Harris administration's new rule mandating the replacement of lead pipes provides "yet another example of the stark difference between the two presidential candidates," an advocate said.
Oct 08, 2024
The Biden administration on Tuesday set a final rule requiring the replacement of nearly all of the nation's lead pipes within ten years, a clean drinking water initiative that drew praise from public health experts and advocacy groups.
The new rule, which The New York Times and The Washington Post both called "landmark," was brought forth by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and requires the replacement of an estimated 9.2 million lead service lines serving millions of people across the country. Lead is a neurotoxin that can cause long-term damage to the brain and nervous system, particularly to children.
The administration of former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, had "slowed the pace of lead service line replacements," according to Food & Water Watch, an advocacy group.
"We applaud the Biden-Harris administration for strengthening the rule to remove lead from our drinking water," Mary Grant, a campaign director at Food & Water Action, said in a statement. "These long-awaited improvements will replace the weak regulation adopted by Donald Trump, and in doing so, will protect millions of people from lasting harm from this dangerous neurotoxin."
Grant said the new rule highlighted the stakes of the upcoming presidential election, in which Trump faces Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee.
"Today's action is yet another example of the stark difference between the two presidential candidates," she added. "Only Vice President Kamala Harris is serious about the safety of our drinking water. A Trump reelection could reverse progress on safe water."
This is a historic victory for public health. Lead pipes have poisoned American drinking water for decades, affecting as many as two-thirds of children under 6 in cities like Chicago.
Clean water is a RIGHT, not a privilege. Thank you, @EPA @POTUS! 👏💧https://t.co/ZQyTt0mMI4
— Progressive Caucus (@USProgressives) October 8, 2024
Lead, prized for its durability, has been used in water pipes since Ancient Rome—the English word "plumbing" descends from the Latin word "plumbum," meaning lead.
Congress banned the construction of new lead pipes in the U.S. in 1986 and passed the Safe Drinking Water Act, which includes regulations on lead, in 1991.
However, phasing out the use of older pipes has gone very slowly, to the frustration of public health experts. There has been "no meaningful improvement in protecting communities" in three decades, until now, according to a statement from Earthjustice, an advocacy group.
"Lead contamination is a longstanding public health emergency, and the Biden-Harris administration's rule is a monumental step forward in addressing the urgent need for safe, clean drinking water," said Patrice Simms, Earthjustice's vice president of litigation for healthy communities.
People of color and on low incomes are disproportionately affected by lead contamination, which is often found in big cities. Chicago has more lead pipes than any other U.S. city.
Flint, Michigan—a majority Black city—faced a public health crisis caused by lead pipes starting in 2014. Then-President Barack Obama signed an emergency declaration and sent aid to the city in 2016. More than 100,000 residents were exposed to elevated lead levels.
Still, the federal government didn't move to tighten lead rules until November 2023, when the EPA issued a proposal to do so. The announcement of the final rule on Tuesday was accompanied by an outpouring of support—and relief.
"A game changer for kids and communities, EPA's finalized lead and copper rule improvements will ensure that we will never again see the preventable tragedy of a city, or a child, poisoned by their lead pipes," Mona Hanna, a pediatrician in Flint and a public health professor at Michigan State University whose research helped expose the crisis there, said in the EPA statement announcing the rule change.
Betsy Southerland, the former director of science and technology in the EPA's water division, also celebrated the agency's move, according to an Environmental Protection Network statement:
The American people have known for over 30 years that there is no safe level of lead and have waited too long for lead pipes to be replaced. Finally, the lead pipes that deliver water to over 9 million homes will be replaced before they damage the mental and physical development of another generation of children. Today is the first time there is an actual deadline for lead pipe replacement to happen and significant financial and technical assistance to get the job done.
The White House is counting on the initiative being popular, especially in swing states in the Midwest. President Joe Biden is scheduled to visit Wisconsin to "tout" the new policy, the Timesreported. The EPA's statement says it will "create good-paying local jobs."
Natalie Quillian, a White House deputy chief of staff, said that "all Americans, no matter where they come from, should have access to their most basic needs, including being able to turn on the tap and drink clean drinking water without fear," according to the Post.
The new rule, in addition to mandating the replacement of pipes, establishes a stricter standard for lead contamination, moving it from 15 parts per billion to 10 ppb and requiring public utilities to provide filters if that level is exceeded. Some advocates had called for a standard between 0 and 5 ppb.
Utilities are expected to challenge the new rule in court, as they've done with the EPA's regulations on "forever chemicals" in drinking water.
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Trump White House Limited 'Sham' FBI Kavanaugh Probe, Senate Report Confirms
"The Trump White House exercised total control over the scope of the investigation, preventing the FBI from interviewing relevant witnesses and following up on tips," reads a new report.
Oct 08, 2024
"Our suspicions are confirmed," said one veteran women's rights advocate on Tuesday after a U.S. Senate report was released on former Republican President Donald Trump's suppression of a federal probe into Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) released a report after an investigation that he said took six years to complete due to a lack of access to Federal Bureau of Investigation correspondence and officials, but that ultimately revealed the Trump White House "exercised total control over the scope" of the FBI's investigation into allegations that Kavanaugh had committed sexual assault.
The report was released as U.S. voters in some states have already begun heading to the polls to vote in the 2024 election, in which Trump is running for a second term.
Whitehouse launched his investigation in 2018 after Kavanaugh was confirmed to the Supreme Court—a major victory for the far right as it sought to gut federal abortion rights, which the justices did in 2022. Kavanaugh's confirmation followed allegations of sexual assault made by Christine Blasey Ford, who testified at an explosive hearing, and Deborah Ramirez, a Yale classmate of the judge.
A supplemental background investigation into Blasey Ford's allegations was begun by the FBI in response to the allegations, but the probe failed to uncover corroborating evidence for Blasey Ford's claims—a fact that several senators cited when explaining why they voted to confirm Kavanaugh despite the accusations against him.
Whitehouse's report found that the supplemental background investigation was "flawed and incomplete"—criticisms that were shared by Democratic senators and rights advocates at the time—and furthermore, that Trump's claim that the FBI would have "free rein" over the probe was a "sham."
"The Trump White House exercised total control over the scope of the investigation, preventing the FBI from interviewing relevant witnesses and following up on tips. The White House refused to authorize basic investigatory steps that might have uncovered information corroborating the allegations," reads the report, titled Unworthy of Reliance.
The report confirms that the FBI received more than 4,500 calls and electronic messages about Kavanaugh, but on instructions from the White House, officials forwarded the tips to the Trump administration "without investigation."
"If anything, the White House may have used the tip line to steer FBI investigators away from derogatory or damaging information," said Whitehouse.
The report found that the FBI interviewed only 10 people before concluding the supplemental background investigation on October 4, 2018, two days before Kavanaugh was confirmed by an historically narrow margin.
The people interviewed by the FBI had "firsthand knowledge of the allegations," but agents did not speak to "the witnesses potentially with the most firsthand knowledge"—Blasey Ford and Kavanaugh.
"Sometimes having what you know confirmed doesn't make it better," said Ilyse Hogue, former president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, now called Reproductive Freedom for All. Hogue and other reproductive justice advocates sounded the alarm in 2018 that the FBI's probe was "a total joke" that "disregarded women."
With the Trump administration circumscribing the FBI investigation and prohibiting officials from following up on leads, said Whitehouse, "senators cast their vote on the confirmation of a Supreme Court nominee credibly accused of sexual assault by multiple women on the basis of a truncated and incomplete investigation about whose scope the senators had been misled."
Debra Katz, a lawyer for Blasey Ford, applauded Whitehouse's probe and called for the Office of the Inspector General at the FBI to investigate the "sham" that took place in 2018.
"The congressional report published today confirms what we long suspected: The FBI supplemental investigation of then-nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh was, in fact, a sham effort directed by the Trump White House to silence brave victims and other witnesses who came forward and to hide the truth," said Katz and Lisa Banks, another attorney who represented Blasey Ford.
Whitehouse said his investigation showed how the FBI's supplemental background investigation process "can be easily manipulated," and "would benefit from greater transparency."
"The FBI and White House should implement clear, written procedures that apply uniformly to the conduct of supplemental
background investigations—or at least to situations like the Kavanaugh nomination, where major allegations of misconduct surface after a nominee's initial background investigation is complete," reads the report. "Only then can the Senate be assured that a supplemental background investigation is used to gather rather than suppress information."
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Ex-Israeli PM Says Netanyahu Wants to Draw US Into 'Reckless' War With Iran
"I'm afraid that if Israel will start a war, a comprehensive war against Iran... America will join in to help Israel," said former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. "And that is what Netanyahu believes."
Oct 08, 2024
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told the British outlet Channel 4 on Monday that he believes current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to drag the U.S. into a war with Iran, an effort that the ex-Israeli leader called "reckless."
Asked whether he thinks Netanyahu "wants to draw the United States into a confrontation with Iran," Olmert replied, "I suspect that he does."
"I think that's reckless because I'm afraid that if Israel will start a war, a comprehensive war against Iran, and it will expand and Israel will not be in a very comfortable situation, America will join in to help Israel. And that is what Netanyahu believes to be the case," said Olmert, who served as Israel's prime minister from 2006 to 2009 and was succeeded by Netanyahu.
Olmert expressed support for Israel's killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah—a move that prompted Iranian retaliation earlier this month—and said that "something needs to be done" with regard to Iran.
"What needs to be done needs to be done with care, with sensitivity, with responsibility, and with a sense of proportion," Olmert added. "And I'm not certain that Netanyahu wants this proportion. He looks at the leadership of the international community, the Western world, and he says, 'Who are they? I'm Bibi Netanyahu.'"
Watch the interview:
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert tells Channel 4 News that he ‘suspects’ Netanyahu wants to draw the US into a confrontation with Iran. pic.twitter.com/crCktsgmEn
— Channel 4 News (@Channel4News) October 8, 2024
Olmert's remarks came amid growing concern that the U.S.-armed Israeli military could be preparing to bomb Iran's nuclear energy facilities in response to Iran's ballistic missile attack last week. The New York Timesnoted Monday that "there is a rising call inside Israel, echoed by some in the United States, to seize the moment" and strike Iranian nuclear facilities.
Former president Donald Trump, the 2024 GOP nominee, said over the weekend that Israel should "hit the nuclear first and worry about the rest later."
Speaking to reporters last Thursday, U.S. President Joe Biden said that the U.S. and Israel are "discussing" a possible attack on Iranian oil infrastructure. The president has said he would oppose an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities.
Iran has pledged to retaliate against an Israeli attack with a "crushing" blow, heightening fears of a full-blown regional war as Israel continues its devastating assault on Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon.
Dylan Williams, vice president for government affairs at the Center for International Policy, said Monday that "President Biden needs to decide if he is finally going to rein in and end his unconditional arming of Netanyahu, or if he will let Netanyahu draw the United States and its forces into war with Iran—a country that is nearly four times the size of Iraq and has twice the population."
U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, has done nothing to distance herself from Biden's unconditional support for Israel despite vocal calls for her to back an arms embargo against the country.
In a closely watched "60 Minutes" interview that aired late Monday, Harris said that "Israel has a right to defend itself" while conceding that "far too many innocent Palestinians have been killed."
But she did not say she would be willing to use U.S. military aid to Israel as leverage to secure a cease-fire agreement.
Harris also named Iran when asked which country she considers to be the United States' "greatest adversary"—an answer that CBSdid not air as part of its televised broadcast of the "60 Minutes" interview.
Harris went on to say that one of her "highest priorities" as president would be to "ensure that Iran never achieves the ability to be a nuclear power." Asked whether she would take military action in the face of "proof that Iran is building a nuclear weapon," the vice president responded that she is "not going to talk about hypotheticals."
Sina Toossi, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, called Harris' answer on Iran "completely out of touch" and said it underscores "the irrational U.S. obsession with Iran, which is driven by politics and donor money, not U.S. interests."
Last week, a coalition of more than 80 advocacy organizations warned the Biden-Harris administration that "it is not in the national interest for the U.S. to be led into a war with Iran by Benjamin Netanyahu's government in Israel."
"It is in the strong national interest to utilize diplomacy, backed by full American leverage—including withholding further offensive weapons transfers to Israel’s military—to move all the parties back from the brink and toward a ceasefire that ends the devastation of Gaza and Lebanon and reverses the slide to regional war," the groups added.
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