Whose job is it to protect the environment — the states’ or the federal government’s? For President Trump, the answer depends on what he wants to pollute next.

When his goal is to allow pollution of our rivers, wetlands, lakes, and streams, he feels it’s best to defer to the states. That’s what his administration said earlier this month when it weakened needed federal protections for tens of millions of acres of wetlands and millions of miles of small streams.

When Trump wants to enable more pollution of the air we breathe, he takes power away from the states —…

As coastal residents of the U.S. Southeast struggle to bail out from Hurricane Dorian, a new NRDC report shows why many will likely use federal aid to rebuild on property certain to flood again, rather than relocate to higher ground.

The problem: It takes five years, on average, to receive a federal buyout for flooded properties. That’s far too long, in many cases, for people to wait for the assistance they need to relocate, so they stay put and make do until disaster strikes next.

That can hit hardest in low-income communities, among people of color and others who too…

The annual Group of 7 summit is a unique forum, a chance for the leaders of Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the United States to seek consensus on some of the world’s most pressing challenges.

For decades U.S. leadership has provided the center of gravity for the yearly meetings, which gather heads of state from countries that together account for nearly half the world’s economic activity.

On Monday, though, when the group took up the issues of climate change, biodiversity, and oceans, President Trump couldn’t be bothered to attend. …

Racism, ignorance, and xenophobia do violence to American values — and to values essential to environmentalism. This gives environmentalists a particular responsibility to speak out against these evils.

President Trump recently called for four women of color, duly elected to the House of Representatives, to “go back” to their country of origin. He then provoked and reveled in menacing chants of “Send her back” at a campaign rally in North Carolina.

The targets of Trump’s comments are U.S. Representatives Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan. All are U.S…

In our relentless fight for cleaner air, cleaner water, habitat preservation, and climate action, it has become unambiguously clear that communities of color, tribal communities, and low-income communities bear a disproportionate share of our collective environmental burden.

There’s a long and clear pattern of locating our dirtiest industrial facilities in communities that lack the wealth and political power to push back. In these overburdened areas, residents must deal daily with air that chokes them, water that sickens them, and other forms of pollution that pose a severe and near-constant threat to their health. And while storms, floods, and other climate…