If implemented, the new rule would shorten the time it takes to review chemicals, and alter the methodology used to assess their dangers. It would also prohibit states from banning or restricting dangerous chemicals, and could invalidate hundreds of state-level protections. “This is a ...

“There’s so much chaos and confusion,” said Kyla Bennett, who speaks regularly with employees of the federal Environmental Protection Agency in her role as director of science policy for nonprofit Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. Many EPA employees have continued to ...

“All conventional farms are allowed to use biosolids,” Kyla Bennett, the director of science policy at Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, said. “So that’s hundreds of millions of people in the U.S. eating food from farms that use biosolids. So the ...

Until recently, the EPA had been using carryover funds to keep its staff on the job. At the end of last week – 10 days into the shutdown – the agency began sending furlough notices to workers. Tim Whitehouse, executive director at Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, ...

“We are seeing an unprecedented and illegal purge of nonpartisan federal workers,” said Joanna Citron Day, general counsel at PEER, “and it’s getting worse.” “PEER is challenging the Trump administration’s illegal attempt through executive order to allow the president and his ...

Tim Whitehouse, executive director at Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, called the EPA layoffs “illegal and morally corrupt” and said they would inflict trauma on both the federal workforce and the American people who rely on the agency’s services. Read ...

Tim Whitehouse, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, said furloughing most EPA staff “will have lasting negative impacts on the environment of this country.” “This is yet another blow to the hardworking employees at EPA, who have witnessed so much ...

Trump has made clear that he cares little about any unequal fallout from the government shutdown. As he sent National Guard troops into Democratic cities across the country, Trump was asked about a White House memo threatening to deny backpay to the hundreds of thousands of furloughed ...

Tim Whitehouse, the executive director at Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), said the moves by the EPA show who the agency is serving. “The whole chemical industry has had a stranglehold for a long time on the EPA,” he said. Read the PEER Story… ...

“I think the lesson we need to learn from the first nine months of the Trump administration is that when they say things, they mean it,” said Tim Whitehouse, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, speaking about the proposed additional layoffs at ...

Vought had asked federal agencies to develop plans for layoffs during the shutdown beyond usual furloughs. Democrats and unions have questioned whether such layoffs would be legal, and they said the new threat regarding back pay wasn’t on firm ground. The OMB memo “is an effort for ...

The judge’s decision is a setback for the farmers in Texas and elsewhere who are searching for federal leadership on PFAS, said Laura Dumais, staff counsel at Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. “It’s a hugely disappointing decision for them,” said Dumais, who ...

Trump had doubled down on the threat to fire federal employees yesterday afternoon, which spurred a set of federal employee unions to file a lawsuit alleging that the threats are an unlawful abuse of power. “The plan to exploit a shutdown to purge federal workers is illegal, ...

“We disagree,” Laura Dumais, staff counsel at PEER, said. “We think a timeline should be inferred from the statute. It’s just really heartbreaking for the ranching families that are plaintiffs in this case and for farmers all across the country whose land has been contaminated from ...

“We’re all going to suffer because these turf fields — particularly the old ones, which we know have PFAS — are going to leach off and contaminate farmers’ fields, groundwater, drinking water supplies, and surface waters,” said Kyla Bennett, a former EPA official who is now ...

Organizations that represent the interests of public workers have been more explicit: “The plan to exploit a shutdown to purge federal workers is illegal, unconstitutional, and deeply disturbing,” Tim Whitehouse, the executive director of Public Employees for Environmental ...

PFAs (aka Forever Chemicals) are ubiquitous synthetic compounds found in products from food packaging, to cosmetics, water-repellent clothing, carpets, dental floss, nonstick cookware, fire-fighting foam, fertilizers and especially in our water supply. They degrade the environment and are ...

Wastewater treatment facilities pay companies to haul away tons of human excrement or “biosolids.” These companies then have to get rid of the waste and often give it to farmers for free, who then spread it on their land. Kyla Bennett, Director of Science Policy at Public ...

The move to halt the agency’s scientific research has prompted concern from scientists and environmental groups that findings could be altered to conform to the Trump administration’s political agenda. “Science is not supposed to be political,” said Kyla Bennett, director of ...

“Settlements are a step forward, but they don’t pay medical bills, allow farmers to use their land again, or actually clean—rather than just filter—contaminated water,” Bennett concludes. “What needs to happen is federal action—something we won’t see under this ...