Trump Administration Erases the Government’s Power to Fight Climate Change

Photo from Union of Concerned Scientists website

The Trump Administration has revoked a Clean Air Act finding dating from 2009 that has been the basis for climate pollution regulations here in the United States. That 2009 finding determined that pollutants from developing and burning fossil fuels, such as methane and carbon dioxide, could be regulated under the Clean Air Act. For more than 15 years, that scientific determination formed the legal backbone of federal climate protections. Known as the “endangerment finding,” this rule recognized what decades of science made clear: air and climate pollution harms people.
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The Environmental Protection Agency now argues that the Clean Air Act does not give it the legal authority to regulate greenhouse gases. The administration’s decision comes after three of the hottest years ever recorded. On February 12, 2026, the Trump administration repealed the bedrock scientific finding that greenhouse gases threaten human life and the environment. In other words, the Environmental Protect Agency will no longer regulate and control the pollution that is dangerously heating the planet. 

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This action is a key step in removing limits on carbon dioxide, methane, and four other greenhouse gases that scientists say are supercharging heat waves, droughts, wildfires, and other extreme weather.     <continued--please read>

Led by a president who refers to climate change as “a hoax,” the administration is essentially saying that the vast majority of scientists around the world are wrong and that a hotter planet is not the menace that decades of research shows it to be. They have rejected facts that have been accepted for decades by presidents of both parties, including Richard Nixon (whose top adviser six decades ago warned of the dangers of climate change) and President George H.W. Bush, who first signed an international climate treaty.

This irrational reversal aids the efforts of a small group of conservative activists—along with oil, gas, and coal interests—to stop the country from transitioning away from fossil fuels and toward solar, wind, and other nonpolluting energy. “This is about as big as it gets,” President Trump said at the White House as a smiling Lee Zeldin, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, stood by. “We are officially terminating the so-called ‘endangerment finding,’ a disastrous Obama-era policy.,” Trump called it a “radical rule” that became “the basis for the Green New Scam,” a label the president gives to any effort to curb emissions or develop renewable energy.
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The Trump administration asserts that scientists are wrong about the dangers of climate change, and that the regulations hurt industry and slow the economy. The false claim that ending the rule will save Americans $1.3 trillion, primarily through cheaper cars and trucks, did not factor in the costs of extreme weather caused by climate change or the costs of pollution-related health issues.  

This reversal is not merely a regulatory tweak. It is this administration’s declaration that climate change doesn’t exist, and that the federal government has no role in addressing the pollution and industries that cause it. It has no basis in law, science, or reality. The Trump administration is officially denying both settled science and the government’s legal obligation to address climate change.

Particularly galling is the fact that the decision comes while Americans are facing increasing and intensifying wildfires, hurricanes, and other climate-change-fueled disasters. From intensified storms and chronic flooding, to extreme heat, to worsening smog that aggravates asthma — communities across our region are grappling with the impacts of a warming planet every day.

Multiple  environmental and public health organizations are defending our bedrock environmental laws in court and advocating for state-level climate policies and legislation that will make our communities more resilient. We must act to protect clean air, clean water, and a livable climate for the next generation.
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No one voted for dirty air or a broken climate! We must fight for our region and begin a new era of climate protections. The science has not changed, and our commitment to protecting southern communities has not changed. Together, we can build an environmental protection movement that endures across the South and the country.  

. . . . Information from the New York Times, Southern Environmental Law Center, the Sierra Club, National Public Radio, EarthJustice, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and others was used to develop this Viewpoint piece. We are grateful to the rigorous reporting by journalists associated with these organizations who diligently work to provide accurate, truthful information about our world. 
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