CARB Chair responds to another Trump directive

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) Chairwoman, Mary Nichols, responded today to a new Presidential directive that she claims will weaken air pollution control efforts and threaten the public's health.

Mary Nichols

Photo: CARB

The Presidential Memorandum, which was issued yesterday by President Trump. directs the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to speed up the review of permit applications, air quality plans, and other areas to streamline and make more efficient a variety of air pollution programs, policies, and procedures.

In the Memorandum, President Trump asserts that existing EPA requirements and procedures have resulted in "unnecessary impediments to new manufacturing and business expansion essential for a growing economy."

In response, Nichols said, “This order caves to a minority of industries who claim Clean Air Act standards are too strict, too costly and too burdensome. The truth is a large body of research shows the Clean Air Act dramatically improves public health, especially among our most vulnerable populations. The consequences of inaction are irresponsible -- unhealthy people, shortened lives, and greater demands on our health care system.”

Millions appalled as Trump nominates oil industry lackey, Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, to head agency

Follow the money. For those who think our government is for sale, recent actions by our future President have done little to allay those fears.

The health and welfare of millions of Americans is about to take another hit with the news that President-elect Donald Trump has nominated Scott Pruitt to lead the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Photo: Scott Pruitt, www.ok.gov website. Fair use

Pruitt is the Attorney General for Oklahoma and for several years, with the backing of hundreds of thousands of dollars from the oil industry, has fought to prevent new EPA regulations from being implemented, particularly those that address man-made climate change.

Pruitt is a climate change denier and seemingly does whatever the fossil fuel industry asks him to do. Correspondence protesting environmental regulations sent on his letterhead to government agencies and officials, under his signature, has reportedly been actually written by energy industry lobbyists. These include letters to EPA, the Department of the Interior, and President Obama, among others.

Coupled with the previous announcement that the notorious global warming skeptic Myron Ebell will be leading Trump's effort to revamp federal agencies that deal with environmental issues, this latest nomination has raised a firestorm of protest among environmentalists.

Gene Karpinski, president of the League of Conservation Voters said that having Pruitt lead the EPA is "...like the fox guarding the henhouse."

Said Earthjustice President Trip Van Noppen, "Every American should be appalled that ...Trump just picked someone who has made a career of being a vocal defender for polluters to head our Environmental Protection Agency."

Is Trump empire angling to make millions from climate change? Ivanka to meet with Al Gore today.

The eyebrows of many who follow the topic of climate change and global warming were raised today with the news that Ivanka Trump, the daughter of President-elect Donald Trump, will be meeting with former U.S. Vice-President Al Gore today.

Ms. Trump has previously indicated her interest in the subject, reportedly hoping to make it her signature issue. Although her father was not scheduled to attend the meeting, CNN has just reported that both he and his daughter met with Mr. Gore.

Photo: Ivanka Trump - Facebook profile picture, Fair Use

Many observers have noted the spider web of potential business conflicts of Donald Trump's many family businesses with his upcoming responsibilities as President. Some have said that the Trumps may try to use their new position of power to influence contract negotiations involving their private businesses.

Indeed, Ivanka previously sat in with the President-elect's meeting with Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe last month. The meeting soon proved controversial when it became known that she was also in the process of trying to get a licensing deal with a Japanese retail firm, Sanei International. That firm's parent company is the Bank of Japan, which is owned by the Japanese government.

Given her father's previous descriptions of climate change as a hoax and a marketing tool, is Ivanka's interest in the subject one of environmental activism or one of a business person checking out all of the angles, using her new position as a close advisor to her President-elect father to "make a buck?"