Free Republic

Environmental organizations lost their bid Tuesday to immediately access $16 billion in grant money that was frozen by the Trump administration earlier this year. In a split decision, a three-judge panel from the DC Circuit Court of Appeals found the Trump administration was within its rights to stop $20 billion from the Biden-era Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund that was promised to eight groups. “While some grantees may be forced to shutter their operations during the litigation, their harms do not outweigh the interests of the government and the public in the proper stewardship of billions of taxpayer dollars,” Tuesday’s ruling...

An appeals court has overturned a federal judge’s ruling blocking the Environmental Protection Agency from terminating $20 billion in grants for several climate groups. A three-judge U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Tuesday issued a 2-1 ruling in favor of the Trump EPA’s efforts to slash billions of dollars in grant money to green groups obligated during former President Joe Biden‘s administration. The District of Columbia Circuit Court judges were Gregory Katsas, Neomi Rao, and Cornelia Pillard, who dissented. The district court “abused its discretion” by issuing the injunction preventing the EPA from rescinding the funds, the judges wrote. They...

Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, has been an instrumental figure in dismantling the climate science regime during the second Trump administration, including major funding cuts in partnership with the Department of Government Efficiency. Now, nearly half of the states' attorneys general have called on Zeldin to strike at the head of another climate institution: the Environmental Law Institute. Headed by Attorney General Austin Knudsen of Montana and signed by 22 other state AGs, the letter calls on Zeldin to cut funding grants for the Environmental Law Institute, which operates the Climate Judiciary Project. The letter says...

EPA Director Lee Zeldin told Miranda Devine, her podcast, that $20 billion was laundered through a network of "pass-through" NGOs from the "Inflation Reduction Act" to groups controlled by former Obama and Biden administration officials. EPA DIRECTOR LEE ZELDIN: When I was going through the confirmation process, this video comes out—it was done through Project Veritas. It was of a Biden EPA employee who was talking about how the agency was “tossing gold bars off the Titanic,” rushing to get billions of dollars out the door before Inauguration Day. He was also talking about the desire to get themselves jobs...

Known for the eponymous reptiles that inhabit the nearby swamps, the migrant detention center dubbed "Alligator Alcatraz" faces the possibility of being shut down over concerns about some of the area's lesser-known inhabitants -- the Everglades' bats, panthers, and storks.A federal judge on Wednesday is set to hold an evidentiary hearing over whether to block operations at the controversial facility because construction of the site allegedly bypassed federally required environmental impact studies.The hearing -- at which federal, state, and tribal officials are expected to testify -- comes amid heightened scrutiny of the facility, which was once touted as a "one-stop...

After a few decades in the wilderness, it looks like the skeptics are now suddenly prevailing in the climate wars. I have long said that this would inevitably happen, and that it was only a question of time, because the laws of physics and economics would inevitably prevail. But what I didn’t know was how much time it would take — perhaps a few years, or maybe many decades. It’s much like North Korea. Their non-functioning communist system will inevitably collapse — but when? Much credit for the sudden reversal in the climate struggles goes to President Trump. But it...

If finalized, the move would escalate the Trump administration’s efforts to claw back billions of dollars in climate grants awarded under President Biden.The Trump administration is preparing to terminate $7 billion in federal grants intended to help low- and moderate-income families install solar panels on their homes, according to two people briefed on the matter.The Environmental Protection Agency is drafting termination letters to the 60 nonprofit groups and state agencies that received the grants under the “Solar for All” program, with the goal of sending the letters by the end of this week, according to the two people, who spoke...

The Carbon Dioxide Endangerment Finding, first enacted in 2009, rested on claims that rising levels of CO2 posed a dire threat to public health and welfare...By removing the Endangerment Finding, the EPA is signaling a long-overdue return to rational, evidence-based policy.

It’s been a long time coming. But today the EPA, through its Administrator Lee Zeldin, finally began the formal process of rescinding the so-called “Endangerment Finding” (EF). The EF is the 2009 regulatory action by which the Obama-era EPA purported to determine that CO2 and other greenhouse gases constitute a “danger to human health and welfare.” That Finding then formed the basis for all subsequent federal greenhouse gas regulations, including efforts of Obama and Biden regulators to force the closure of all power plants running on coal and natural gas, and to mandate increased vehicle mileage to levels that no...

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin on Tuesday released the agency’s proposal to rescind what he has described as the “holy grail of the climate change religion,” which has led to over a trillion dollars in regulatory impact. Zeldin made the announcement to repeal the Obama-era Endangerment Finding at an auto dealer in Indiana alongside U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright, Gov. Mike Braun (R-IN), Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita, and American Trucking Association President and CEO Chris Spear. The EPA has said the Endangerment Finding has been used to justify over $1 trillion in regulations, including the Biden-Harris...

The Trump administration has announced a plan to scrap a landmark finding that greenhouse gases are harmful to the environment, severely curbing the federal government's ability to combat climate change. Known as the "Endangerment Finding", the 2009 order from then-President Barack Obama allowed the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to create rules to limit pollution by setting emissions standards. ... The Endangerment Finding stemmed from a 2007 Supreme Court case in which the court ruled that greenhouse gases are "air pollutants" - meaning that the EPA has the authority and responsibility to regulate them under the US Clean Air Act....

EPA employees staged a political stunt, tried to take it back when it bombed, and revealed just how deeply entitlement and arrogance run through the federal workforce. The Information Age brought rapid technological progress and unprecedented access to knowledge. But one rule still holds true: Once it’s on the internet, it’s there forever. Some EPA employees are now learning that the hard way. The signatories of the now-infamous “Stand Up for Science” declaration — an act of open defiance against the Trump administration — are scrambling to erase their names after their stunt blew up in their faces. The petition,...

The Biden Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) hastily shoveled billions in taxpayer dollars to Democrat-aligned green groups without having concrete agreements in place, according to documents obtained by watchdog group Protect the Public’s Trust (PPT). The documents indicate that the Biden EPA awarded grants under the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) — a program that shelled out $20 billion to nonprofits linked to Democrat donors and insiders — on a timeline that allowed changes to the terms even after the money was awarded. The Biden EPA had until September 2024 to award the taxpayer funds, and staff were advised to delay...

Staffers at the Environmental Protection Agency who signed a letter of dissent against President Donald Trump have been placed on leave, reports The Hill. "The Environmental Protection Agency has a zero-tolerance policy for career bureaucrats unlawfully undermining, sabotaging, and undercutting the administration's agenda as voted for by the great people of this country last November," EPA spokesperson Brigit Hirsch said in a written statement. A group of more than 170 employees at the EPA on Monday published a declaration of dissent from policies under the Trump administration, saying, they "undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment."...

A group of Environmental Protection Agency employees on Monday published a declaration of dissent from the agency’s policies under the Trump administration, saying they “undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment.” More than 170 EPA employees put their names to the document, with about 100 more signing anonymously out of fear of retaliation, according to Jeremy Berg, a former editor-in-chief of Science magazine who was among non-EPA scientists or academics to also sign. The latter figure includes 20 Nobel laureates. The letter represents rare public criticism from agency employees who could face blowback for speaking out...

The Trump administration just dealt another blow to the anti-energy, anti-prosperity agenda pursued by the Biden administration underpinned by the man-made “climate change” hypothesis. Under the proposed repeal of previous “climate” regulations on energy production announced this month, many of the power plants targeted for destruction could remain open, and CO2 would no longer be considered dangerous “pollution.” Naturally, that has the “climate” movement screaming bloody murder. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the effect of the so-called greenhouse gases coming from U.S. energy production using hydrocarbons (or “fossil fuels”) is so small as to be negligible. The agency...

Ammaad Akhtar, 33, is accused of trying to give money, guns and ammunition to someone he thought was part of the terror group, and of making antisemitic threats. Menachem Wecker, Izzy Salant ... The LinkedIn profile of Ammaad Akhtar identifies him as a resident of Stockton, Calif., and a “mechanical engineering graduate” who is “outgoing and friendly,” a “great team player” and a “great leader.” A very different picture emerges about Akhtar, who remains listed as a hazardous substances engineer at the California Environmental Protection Agency, in the criminal complaint accusing him of trying to give money, guns and ammunition...

The Supreme Court sided Friday with oil companies seeking to challenge California’s electric vehicle regulations. In a 7-2 ruling, the court allowed energy producers to continue their lawsuit challenging the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision to approve California regulations that require manufacturing more electric vehicles. “The government generally may not target a business or industry through stringent and allegedly unlawful regulation, and then evade the resulting lawsuits by claiming that the targets of its regulation should be locked out of court as unaffected bystanders,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in the majority opinion. “In light of this Court’s precedents and the evidence...

Now coming into view are the specifics of EPA’s strategy to end the Obama/Biden efforts to strangle the energy sector of the economy in the name of “saving the planet” from climate change. A document released by EPA last week on June 11 lays out the plan for repeal of the absurd (and dangerous) regulation that would have ended use of fossil fuels to generate electricity by some time in the 2030s. This EPA document is particularly interesting for the way it treats — and effectively sidelines — the so-called Endangerment Finding, the 2009 regulatory action that is the basis...

Yesterday, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced the proposed repeal of the Biden-era’s Clean Power Plan 2.0, which ruled that coal-fired and many new natural gas power plants must capture and store over 90% of their carbon emissions by the 2030s—or shut down by 2040. It’s a costly mandate, resting on shaky legal and technical foundations. Americans would be fortunate to have it repealed. President Biden issued his Clean Power Plan 2.0 after the Supreme Court ruled in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency that President Obama’s Clean Power Plan 1.0 exceeded the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) statutory authority. The Court’s...