Environmental Justice at Risk Under Project 2025

The first Trump administration was a disaster for the environment. Now, with a second administration set to take office, the damage will be much worse. I would know-I was there at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), working to protect the most overburdened and at-risk communities in our nation while the agency was under siege.

Much of Project 2025 is poised for implementation, taking the lessons from the first Trump administration and advancing a destruction of health and environmental protections that will touch every community in our country and be absolutely devastating for environmental justice communities.

At its core, Project 2025 is a blueprint to hollow out federal agencies and shift power into the hands of political appointees and their industry taskmasters. This would transform agencies like the EPA into empty shells, incapable of carrying out their regulatory responsibilities. Instead of protecting public health and the environment, these "zombie agencies" would serve private interests disguised as political priorities, further marginalizing populations that are already underserved.

Learn More

Communities across the nation will feel the devastating impact of an EPA stripped of its powerto regulate and protect against environmental harms. People rely on the agency to ensure clean air, safe drinking water, protection from toxic chemicals, and action against our changing climate. The stakes are now even higher for the communities who are always hit first and hit worst by climate disasters and pollution.

Environmental justice(EJ) is a central part of the EPA's mission, which makes the impending impacts of Project 2025 far greater than when I led the EJ program under Trump's first administration. This is largely due to the historic strides made by the Biden administration, which greatly expanded its focus on environmental justice. Under Biden's EPA, dedicated EJ staff positions were created; tools like EJScreen-a mapping and screening tool that identifies communities at greater environmental risk-had been put into regular use; and billions of dollars had been directly invested in EJ communities.

New mandates like Justice40-which ensured that at least 40 percent of the benefits of numerous federal environmental investments reached underserved communities-exemplified the commitment to tackling generations of inequity and outright environmental racism.  Now all this progress is at immediate risk of being undone by Project 2025's far-reaching agenda.

The EPA, an agency that has historically made progress protecting us from environmental pollution, will soon become unrecognizable. We all lose in that scenario.

The broader implications of Project 2025 go beyond the EPA. The plan envisions a complete transformation of the executive branch: expanding surveillance, restricting free speech, curtailing abortion rights, rolling back protections for the LGBTQIA2S+ community, and aligning policy with Christian nationalist ideals.  

For those of us who worked in federal agencies during the Trump administration, we understand how such restructuring is intended to not only paralyze the government-its goal is to oppress those with less power. To silence those whose voices are just now being heard. To divide our society and subjugate the poor, the disinvested, and the marginalized. 

The Trump administration's first attempt to dismantle environmental protections faced setbacks due to incompetence and unfamiliarity with internal government processes. This time, they are prepared.

Project 2025 is meticulously detailed, outlining a roadmap to restructure the entire government from day one. It proposes moving EPA offices, reassigning senior executives, and cutting critical programs-moves little understood and hard to defend against from the outside. These steps would bring the agency's work to a grinding halt, crippling its ability to protect public health while taking down decades of progress in environmental justice. 

It's unmistakable that the implications of Project 2025 are now imminent and will be felt most acutely by communities that have long suffered exposure to pollution and environmental hazards-outright dumping and oppression-on a scale that is hard for many to fathom for anyone who did not grow up living in such a reality.  

Leaders in these communities have fought for decades to enjoy things that so many of us take for granted-like clean air to breathe, safe drinking water-and not worrying about contamination in the ground where our children grow up playing.  

If we allow Project 2025 to fully take hold unchecked, the consequences will be disastrous. The EPA, an agency that has historically made progress protecting us from environmental pollution, will soon become unrecognizable. We all lose in that scenario. We lose protection, we lose momentum, we lose progress toward achieving the society of equality that remains the unrealized dream of our nation. And as has always been the case, EJ communities are set to feel that loss far more deeply and immediately than anyone else.

Related Blogs