On Monday, the Environmental Protection Agency quietly removed all information about climate change from its home page and other prominent areas of its website, burying it deep in sections that are harder to find.
Environmental advocates condemned the deletions, part of sweeping efforts to revise federal websites to reflect President Donald Trump’s agenda, saying the information suppression comes at a time when climate upheaval is intensifying damage and harm.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) website overhaul reprised a similar move by Trump’s first administration, which touched off a “Don’t Say Climate” movement among some Republican-led state governments. The new erasure came two days before the US Senate confirmed Trump’s nominee to lead the agency: former representative Lee Zeldin (R-NY), who has pledged to slash EPA funding, roll back environmental protections, and promote more fossil fuel production.
In a related push, Trump’s new transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, is aiming to eliminate fuel economy standards, one of President Joe Biden’s more ambitious environmental initiatives.
Climate change was a featured topic on the front page of the EPA’s website through the final days of the Biden presidency and lingered in the first week of Trump’s. The previous version of the home page noted, “Understanding and addressing climate change is critical to EPA’s mission of protecting human health and the environment,” and included links to information on climate change risks, impacts, and causes.
Shortly after 5 p.m. EST on January 27, all of that climate information was removed and relegated to the site’s “A-Z Topic Index.”
Despite its scientifically proven threats to the future of…
Auteur: Christopher D. Cook
