Tell Congress: Block Executive Order Waiving Environmental Review of Dangerous Projects

From PennEnvironment (http://www.pennenvironment.org):

This might be the most egregious attack on our environmental protections we’ve seen yet.

The administration has signed an executive order waiving environmental review and public comment periods for dangerous and dirty projects such as drilling, mining, pipeline construction and more.¹

With the stroke of a pen, the president is attempting to end 50 years of looking before we leap when it comes to potentially destructive development.

Join us in calling on Congress to block this reckless executive order at https://pennenvironment.webaction.org/p/dia/action4/common/public/?action_KEY=39037.

For 50 years, a law called the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) has protected some of our most precious, environmentally sensitive places by requiring federal agencies to review the environmental impacts of projects such as mining, oil drilling, pipeline construction and road building. For example, this environmental review requirement has been critical to the yearslong effort to stop the infamous Keystone XL pipeline, forming the basis for the Obama administration’s rejection of the pipeline and the legal challenges to the project that have continued under the administration.^2,3

NEPA also requires that the public be given a chance to weigh in on these projects … a chance you’ve likely taken advantage of yourself if you’ve signed many of our petitions.⁴

Now, with a single executive order, the administration is setting aside those critical requirements.

The president cited the COVID-19 pandemic as the reason for this reckless order, but his administration was already trying to weaken NEPA back in January, well before the pandemic hit the United States.^5,6

Waiving environmental review and shutting the public out of the process was a bad idea then, and it’s still a bad idea now.

Tell your U.S. senators and representative: Don’t let the president undo 50 years of smart environmental policy with the stroke of a pen.

We’re calling on Congress to take action to block this executive order. In a world already running short on nature, we should be doing more to protect what we have, not making it easier to build over it. Join the call today.

1. Juliet Eilperin and Jeff Stein, “Trump signs order to waive environmental reviews for key projects,” The Washington Post, June 4, 2020.
2. Ula Chrobak, “Trump’s latest executive order could let agencies shirk environmental responsibility,” Popular Science, June 9, 2020.
3.  Lisa Friedman, “Trump Rule Would Exclude Climate Change in Infrastructure Planning,” The New York Times, January 3, 2020.
4. “Statement: Trump administration undermines key protections in bedrock environmental law,” Environment America, January 9, 2020.
5. “EO on Accelerating the Nation’s Economic Recovery from the COVID-19 Emergency by Expediting Infrastructure Investments and Other Activities,” WhiteHouse.gov, June 4, 2020.
6. Katelyn Burns, “Trump has created a loophole to allow pipelines to avoid environmental review,” Vox, January 9, 2020.