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'Catastrophic Blow': GOP and Three Democrats Confirm Zeldin for EPA
"This dangerous agenda that Zeldin will oversee will roll back vital pollution limits that protect us, abandon clean energy investments, and lock the country into reliance on dirty, expensive fossil fuels," said one campaigner.
Jan 29, 2025
Climate and public health advocates were outraged on Wednesday after a trio of U.S. Senate Democrats
voted with Republicans to confirm President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, former New York Congressman Lee Zeldin.
Critics have warned that Zeldin—like other Cabinet nominees—will serve billionaire polluters, not the American people and the planet, since Trump named him in November. They renewed those warnings after Democratic Sens. John Fetterman (Pa.), Ruben Gallego (Ariz.), and Mark Kelly (Ariz.) voted with Republicans to confirm him as EPA administrator.
After Zeldin's confirmation, the youth-led Sunrise Movement called him "a disaster for our planet and a win for Big Oil."
Climate Action Campaign director Margie Alt said in a statement that "Lee Zeldin's confirmation as EPA administrator is a catastrophic blow to the health of Americans, the climate, and the economy. Under Zeldin's leadership, the Environmental Protection Agency will no longer protect the American people and our communities—it will protect polluters."
Pointing to the new administrator's record and public statements, Alt said that "this dangerous agenda that Zeldin will oversee will roll back vital pollution limits that protect us, abandon clean energy investments, and lock the country into reliance on dirty, expensive fossil fuels that cost families at the gas pump."
"Americans didn't vote for dirtier air, more asthma attacks, or rising healthcare costs, yet that is exactly what Zeldin's EPA will deliver. Vulnerable communities, especially children, and seniors will bear the brunt of these policies, while a few fossil fuel executives rake in profits," she continued. "Zeldin's confirmation is a tragic failure for all Americans."
Marc Yaggi, CEO of Waterkeeper Alliance, declared that "this is a make-or-break moment for clean water, and the American people deserve leadership that puts their needs above the influence of corporate polluters."
While praising Zeldin's past rejection of offshore oil drilling and support for "sensible policies" on "forever chemicals," Yaggi said that "his history of voting against critical infrastructure and environmental funding and opposing clean water and air protections raises serious concerns about his commitment to effectively leading the Environmental Protection Agency."
Moms Clean Air Force suggested a rebrand for the EPA under Zeldin and Trump: Extreme Pollution Agency.
Since returning to the White House just 10 days ago, Trump has already
taken various executive actions to attack the planet.
"The EPA's stated mission is to protect human health and the environment," Sierra Club legislative director Melinda Pierce said. "In the wake of Donald Trump's dangerous executive orders and illegal push to freeze all federal funding, the new EPA administrator will face a decision of whether to carry out the necessary duties of the role, or fold to Trump's deadly fossil fuel-backed agenda and broken promises."
"The American people want to breathe clean air and drink clean water," she stressed. "They want a healthy environment for their families today and the future generations of tomorrow. And they want to know that their government is doing everything in its power to protect them from the destructive impacts of the climate crisis that we sadly witness more and more of each day. That is now Lee Zeldin's charge, and we will do everything in our power to hold him accountable to the American people."
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Climate Movement Alarmed by Trump Declaring Energy Emergency to 'Drill, Baby, Drill'
Green groups vowed to fight against "all attempts by Trump and his allies in Congress to weaken commonsense environmental rules and put polluter profits over the health, safety, and well-being of people and the planet."
Jan 20, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump said during his Monday inaugural address that he would declare a "national energy emergency," intended to help deliver on his campaign pledge to "drill, baby, drill" for climate-heating fossil fuels—one of the Republican's various planned actions that have alarmed green groups in recent days.
Other plans—some confirmed by the Trump administration's White House website—include withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement again, lifting a pause on new liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports, and attacking efforts to limit planet-heating emissions with actions targeting clean energy and automobile rules.
"These actions are an unprecedented handout to billionaires," said Aru Shiney-Ajay, executive director of the youth-led Sunrise Movement. "They will make a small handful of rich men unimaginably richer while killing good-paying jobs and threatening our health and homes. As wildfires rage across California, families flee their homes, and workers struggle to make ends meet, Trump's actions make it clear whose side he's on: the billionaires and powerful corporations who bankrolled his campaign."
The combined wealth of the world's billionaires surged by $2 trillion last year, Oxfam revealed Monday, as some of them joined Trump for his inauguration—an event decried as "a coronation of our country's descent into oligarchy." The president has also nominated billionaires, climate science deniers, and fossil fuel backers to Cabinet posts and other key positions.
"We are organizing in every corner of the country to make sure the American people see these actions for what they are: handouts to billionaires at our expense," said Shiney-Ajay. "Democrats must take off the gloves and do everything in their power to expose this blatant corruption and stand against Donald Trump's agenda."
While the fossil fuel industry applauded what American Gas Association president and CEO Karen Harbert called "President Trump's decisive action to maximize the benefits from our nation's abundant and essential energy and to protect consumer choice," Oil Change International executive director Elizabeth Bast joined Shiney-Ajay in emphasizing the importance of organizing during his second term.
"The fossil fuel industry invested $75 million to secure Trump's victory, and now they're expecting a return on that investment. By appointing fossil fuel CEOs to key Cabinet positions and planning to dismantle critical environmental protections, Trump is handing these companies a blank check to expand their operations at precisely the moment we need to end fossil fuel extraction," Bast said. "But the greed of fossil fuel billionaires and their political allies cannot overcome the power of our movements. In communities across America and around the world, we're standing up not just to toxic fossil fuel projects, but to the bigotry, hatred, and division that props up corporate power."
John Noel, deputy climate program director at Greenpeace USA, similarly highlighted that "during his campaign, Trump openly requested $1 billion from Big Oil. Executive orders like declaring a 'national energy emergency' and rubber-stamping more LNG exports are the prize—a quid pro quo—rewarding those who financed his political rise."
"The latest science and economic analysis from the Department of Energy concludes that unfettered LNG exports are not in the US public interest," Noel noted. "LNG exports have already driven up U.S. energy prices. Rubber-stamping new export authorizations will only exacerbate the cost of living crisis for working people."
Nodding to Trump's previous withdrawal from the Paris agreement, which former President Joe Biden reversed, Oxfam America president and CEO Abby Maxman said that ditching the deal again "is more than reckless—it's economic self-sabotage and a betrayal of every community, both in the U.S. and globally, already facing catastrophic storms, heatwaves, and rising seas."
"While we will have a climate denier in the White House, any predictions that this is 'game over' for climate ambition are wrong," she added. "Most Americans support climate action, and communities, cities, and states across the country are stepping up to work for a sustainable future. The struggle to protect our planet isn't over—and together, we can still win."
Rachel Cleetus, policy director and lead economist for the Union of Concerned Scientists' Climate and Energy Program, similarly called the Paris withdrawal "a travesty" that "is in clear defiance of scientific realities and shows an administration cruelly indifferent to the harsh climate change impacts that people in the United States and around the world are experiencing."
"Last year was the first time global average temperatures exceeded 1.5°C above preindustrial levels for an entire year. Unless world leaders act quickly, the planet is on track for up to a 3.1°C increase, which would be catastrophic," she stressed. "As the largest historical emitter of heat-trapping emissions, the United States has a responsibility to do its fair share to stave off the increasingly dire consequences of the climate crisis."
"His disgraceful and destructive decision is an ominous harbinger of what people in the United States should expect from him and his anti-science Cabinet hell-bent on boosting fossil fuel industry profits at the expense of people and the planet," Cleetus added, pushing for "urgent actions from U.S. and global policymakers" to tackle the fossil fuel-drive climate emergency.
Green groups vowed to spend the next four years fighting against what Food & Water Watch executive director Wenonah Hauter called "Trump's filthy fossil fuel agenda," which she said "may benefit billionaires invested in the oil and gas industry, but it will hammer everyday Americans."
"Trump's declaration of a national energy emergency leverages a false premise to encourage expanded fossil fuel production at a time when the United States is already the top oil and gas producer in the world," said Hauter. "Though Trump claims he is acting to reduce costs for consumers, his actions will only increase expenses for everyone, through higher utility bills, greater pollution impacts, and the overwhelming costs of climate change-supercharged disasters—all falling disproportionately on low-income families and communities of color."
"We will vigorously fight back against any and all attempts by Trump and his allies in Congress to weaken commonsense environmental rules and put polluter profits over the health, safety, and well-being of people and the planet," she pledged.
Kierán Suckling, executive director at the Center for Biological Diversity, declared that "no one in American history has shown more disdain for the environment than Donald Trump. His reckless contempt for our nation's natural heritage and people's health will only get worse, but we'll fight him at every step."
"The United States has some of the strongest environmental laws in the world, and no matter how petulantly Trump behaves, these laws don't bend before the whims of a wannabe dictator," he continued. "The use of emergency powers doesn't allow a president to bypass our environmental safeguards just to enrich himself and his cronies. We'll see Trump in court to challenge each of these horrific, senseless attacks on wildlife, public lands, and our health."
The Center for International Environmental Law said that "our vision remains clear: Justice, democracy, and a sustainable future are not aspirations—they are the foundation of our work and the promise we strive to fulfill every day. With communities and allies around the globe, we stand firmly and unapologetically for a world where these principles thrive, building a future rooted in hope, courage, and collective action."
"It is repugnant that these remarks occur from the highest U.S. office on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day," the group added. "Today, and every day, we channel Dr. King's call to action: 'Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle.' Together and through collective, continuous action, we will bend the arc of history towards justice."
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Senate Democrats' Bill Would Block Trump Fossil Fuel 'Cartel' From Running Key Agencies
"Big Oil executives and fossil fuel lobbyists shouldn't be able to turn public agencies into private profit machines for fossil fuel shareholders," argued Sen. Ed Markey.
Jan 16, 2025
Faced with the imminent White House return of Republican President-elect Donald Trump and an administration stacked with fossil fuel industry veterans, a pair of progressive U.S. Senate Democrats on Thursday introduced legislation that would ban former oil, gas, and coal executives or lobbyists from leading numerous energy-related federal agencies for 10 years after leaving their private sector jobs.
The Banning In Government Oil Industry Lobbyists (BIG OIL) from the Cabinet Act—put forth by Sens. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.)—would apply to prospective secretaries of agriculture, defense, energy, the interior, state, and transportation; as well as key posts including administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; White House chief of staff; and directors of the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Office of Management and Budget.
"Let's pass this bill and get fossil fuel executives and their ill-gotten bucks out of our government."
"Donald Trump isn't building a Cabinet, he's installing a cartel. Big Oil executives and fossil fuel lobbyists shouldn't be able to turn public agencies into private profit machines for fossil fuel shareholders," said Markey. "This is a clear ethical line—their work polluting our environment, destroying our climate, and prioritizing corporate profits over democracy must not be rewarded with even more power over the very safeguards set to protect American households from their influence."
"Especially in the wake of the Los Angeles wildfires and more frequent and dangerous disasters fueled by climate change, we can't afford to have a fossil fuel CEO like Chris Wright help the industry capture our federal agencies further for oil profits," Markey added, referring to the fracking services company chief executive nominated by Trump to head the Department of Energy. "We must have government agencies helmed by responsible, qualified executives without blatant conflicts of interest."
Merkley said: "Climate chaos fueled by dirty energy is humanity's greatest challenge, and Trump wants to make sure we fail that challenge by handing our government over to Big Oil. Let's pass this bill and get fossil fuel executives and their ill-gotten bucks out of our government."
Scores of climate, environmental justice, government transparency, and other groups have endorsed the bill.
"The fossil fuel revolving door has dominated American energy policy for decades and could poison our environment for centuries to come," Food & Water Watch policy adviser Drew Guillory said in a statement Thursday. "Oil and gas companies cannot be allowed to regulate themselves and use the government to guarantee their profits. The BIG OIL from the Cabinet Act is a crucial step in returning control of our climate to the American people."
Kelsey Crane, senior policy advocate at Earthworks, said: "The fossil fuel industry is notorious for spending millions of dollars to delay climate action and undermine progress on environmental justice. This bill ensures big polluters are not granted positions of power where it is guaranteed they would degrade environmental protections and block investments in a clean energy future."
Sunrise Movement executive director Aru Shiney-Ajay noted that "Los Angeles is on fire. Asheville is just starting to rebuild."
"The climate crisis is here and it's happening because oil and gas CEOs disregarded science and chose to keep burning fossil fuels," Shiney-Ajay added. "They chose to sacrifice millions of homes and lives so they could keep profiting. Those same people should not be in charge of creating energy policy."
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