Comprehensive Impacts of Trump’s First Year: Science & Environment
It has been a surreal year. Just when we think things can’t get any worse, lo and behold, a new tweet comes out. Or a new policy is introduced. Or a new world leader is so offended that we get closer to doomsday. Trump’s election has normalized and publicized the proverbial anonymous yahoo comments, and it’s hard to imagine that he still has a small but loud base of support and that people chose this narcissistic, sexist, racist sociopath consciously. He has exemplified our slow, subtle transformation from intelligent citizens to mindless consumers to salivating spectators who have a constant need for entertainment and outrage.
I always said that when voting for president, what we’re really voting for was the Supreme Court. I am going on record to say that I was wrong. Dead wrong. Trump has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that there are so many ways a president can be harmful other than by Supreme Court appointments. To be sure, judicial appointments are one major way that Trump is detrimental to the country, and it will take at least a generation to recover from those appointments alone. But this document shows that a president can do deep and lasting damage in many ways.
Although I vacillate between disgust and defeat and anger, I am trying very hard to channel all of those feelings into fighting against our spiral toward Idiocracy. The only way to do this is for everyone who is eligible to actually get out and vote in every single election. This November’s midterm elections will tell us if Americans are really ready for progress or if they’re apathetic enough to continue our moral, ethical, and constitutional decline.
There have been several year-end round-ups about Trump’s first year. Many of them are laughably revisionist. But there were some informative ones. Axios created a great chart of search trends for some of the biggest news events of the first year, showing how we’ve all jumped from one four-alarm news fire to another. Rolling Stone summarized the damage of Trump’s first year. And Roger Cohen with the New York Times editorialized our frightening reality in If This is America.
This piece is meant to be a comprehensive assessment of the impacts of Trump’s first year as President of the United States of America (let that sink in). There are many things that happened during the campaign that are not included. Included are impacts from January 20, 2017, to January 31, 2018 (in some cases, February 1). There are sure to be things missing, but I have done my best to record these impacts. The impacts are listed under 19 different categories:
2. Science & Environment;
3. Women & Families;
4. LBGT;
5. Judicial/Constitutional;
6. Ethics;
7. Targeting free press/free speech/Privacy;
8. Health & Safety;
9. Consumer Protections;
10. Education;
11. Transportation/Infrastructure/Housing;
12. Immigration;
13. Social Contract;
14. Business/Economy/Budget;
15. Military/Defense/Police;
16. World;
17. General Governance;
18. Character; and
19. Some good news. Because there is always some good news.
Of course, some of the impacts may fit under multiple categories. For example, does Trump’s encouragement of police to treat suspects violently fall under Health and Safety or Law Enforcement? Or maybe Ethics or Character? There are many such conundrums, and I have tried to categorize each example appropriately. Some may disagree on the categorization. And that’s OK. As a researcher, I’m still pondering good ways to visualize all of this data, but in the meantime, it’s listed here. Fair warning: This is long. The items may not necessarily be in chronological order.
Since this will take me months to write, I will publish each section as I complete it. This article is on Trump’s impacts on science and the environment. Previous articles have covered Initial Cabinet Appointments.
I want to acknowledge Amy Siskind’s weekly list of subtle changes that experts in authoritarianism say to watch out for. Amy’s in-depth listings were invaluable, and a must-read itself.
Buckle your seatbelts.
Science & Environment
The differences between Trump and Clinton on almost everything were pretty clear to anyone paying any real attention. But there was particular foreshadowing on issues related to science and the environment. Several organizations are keeping track of Trump’s assault on science and the environment. National Geographic also has a good running list of how Trump is changing science and the environment. As of January 31, 2018, 33 environmental rules have been overturned, 24 rollbacks are in progress, and 10 attempted rollbacks are in limbo. Propublica has a good overview of what it’s like inside the trump administration’s regulatory rollback at the EPA. And Columbia University and the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund launched an online tracker of the Trump administration’s crackdown on climate science. We can clearly see what the US looked like before environmental regulations. In response to the aggressive anti-science, anti-environment stance that Trump has taken, France’s President Macron awarded 18 American scientists grants to move to France to continue their work. He also has welcomed Americans seeking refuge in a pro-science country.
· Almost immediately, the White House website removed climate change content from its website. Within hours, a memorandum was issued, freezing any new or pending regulations governmentwide, snagging four energy efficiency regulations released very late in the Obama administration.
· Later, the EPA’s website came back online with no mention at all about climate change.
· Trump ordered the EPA to scrap the Clean Power Plan and begin dismantling many of the federal government’s other policies for addressing climate change. “[L]ike any move from an impactful president, its biggest consequences would likely be felt not in the next year but in the coming decades and centuries.” The order also targets fossil fuel rules, lifting a moratorium on new coal mining leases on federal land, beginning to relax limits on new coal power plant construction, and rolling back rules designed to limit methane emissions in oil and gas extraction. President Obama’s Climate Action Plan, a blueprint for preparing the country for the impacts of climate change and mitigating them before they happen, is also expected to be scrapped, along with the former president’s other executive orders on climate issues.
· None of this should be surprising, considering that Trump doesn’t know the difference between climate and weather (or, presumably, any other science).
· The House voted to delay an Obama administration rule on ozone pollution and limit future regulations that crackdown on pollution, undermining the Clean Air Act and harming public health.
· The EPA also reversed the “once-in always-in” policy, which required a major source of pollution, such as a power plant, to always be treated as a major source, even if it makes changes to reduce emissions.. This reversal drastically weakens protective limits on air pollutants like arsenic, lead, mercury, and other toxins that cause cancer, brain damage, infertility, developmental problems, and even death.
· A proposed rule will radically expands EPA jurisdiction by placing virtually all land and water under the heavy regulatory hand of the federal government. “The proposed rule is breathtaking in its overreach, and flatly contrary to the will of Congress, which, with the passing of the Clean Water Act, decided that the states should plan the development and use of local land and water resources.”
· Dozens of Environmental Protection Agency’s Board of Scientific Counselors scientists’ contracts were not renewed, leaving a key EPA office without important scientific guidance. Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC). These scientists are an advisory board for the EPA’s Office of Research and Development, and helps the office make sure that it is using sufficiently rigorous science in its research and development programs. Secretary Pruitt wanted to make space for representatives from industries — like the chemical industry, or oil and gas industry — which the EPA is charged with regulating.
· The EPA is also politicizing the science advisory process. It cancelled all upcoming subcommittee meetings when it fired two-thirds of its scientists. They have not met since.
· Two months before purging scientists from the EPA, EPA head Scott Pruitt met with former Canada Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who was known for muzzling climate researchers.
· Scott Pruitt’s EPA recruited a team of researchers to challenge climate change research, despite the fact that the science on climate change is already well-established globally. It is unknown how much taxpayer money is going to fund these researchers to try to show that the world is flat.
· The EPA is also considering allowing the bee-killing pesticide thiamethoxam to be sprayed on the most widely grown crops in the U.S. It announced the decision the same day its own scientists revealed that the chemical also kills birds and aquatic invertebrates.
· Pruitt’s EPA has also lowered the bar for radiation exposure, stating that radiation exposure that is ten or more times higher than guidelines under President Obama’s administration that occurs during disasters is safe.
· The EPA suddenly cancelled the speaking appearances of three scientistswho had been scheduled to discuss climate change at a conference. The agency gave no explanation for the cancellation. This was sadly an example of a long history of governments trying to muzzle, stifle, or censor scientific research.
· The EPA went on to ban certain scientists from serving on independent advisory boards so those seats could go to people from industry who would presumably be friendlier to the industries the EPA is meant to regulate. As one scientist described, “[The] rationale for making this decision rests on a set of false premises about science, grants and even the role of advisory boards. Given his record as administrator so far, this move is not surprising, but it is still damaging. In effect it means that the head of the agency is explicitly turning his back on independent science to guide his decisions.”
· In trying to justify the ban, Pruitt quoted the bible. You can’t make this up.
· On cue, the EPA named new advisors to the advisory boards, all of whom represent various industries that are meant to be regulated by the EPA. These include advisors who don’t believe in climate change and who think that air quality is too clean for children.
· The EPA’s chief of staff subsequently pressured a top scientist to alter her congressional testimony to play down the dismissal of the scientists.
· On a roll, the EPA refused to issue a regulation that ensure that hard-rock mining companies can pay for the costs to clean up their mines when they’re finished.
· While firing scientists, Trump nominated Michael Dourson to lead the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention. Dourson is the founder of a consulting group that has close ties to chemical manufacturing and tobacco industries, which, of course, the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention regulates. Dourson seems to rationalize his connections with biblical references and, in his spare time, self-publishes biblical books.
· As if on a role, Trump named Nancy Beck as Deputy Assistant Administrator of the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention with the EPA. Nancy Beck helped craft the chemical industry’s political agenda with the American Chemistry Council, the powerful lobby whose members include Dow Chemical, DuPont, Monsanto, ExxonMobil Chemical, Chevron Phillips Chemical, and Bayer, among others.
· Several former EPA administrators recently stated that the EPA will take decades to regain its full capabilities and recover from Pruitt’s leadership and the Trump administration.
· Continuing with his record of picking the least appropriate people for posts, Trump named Daniel Smith as the deputy director of the National Parks Service. Smith was previously known for improperly helping the owner of the Washington Redskins cut down more than 130 trees, ignoring of environmental laws.
· Speaking of National Park Service, 10 out of 12 NPS Advisory Board members resigned in frustration because Interior Secretary Zinke suspended all committee meetings and refused to meet with the board. This leaves no governmental body to designate national historic or natural landmarks (which doesn’t seem to matter since Trump is clearing that field). Zinke also disbanded the Wildlife and Hunting Heritage Conservation Council and the Advisory Committee on Climate Change and Natural Resource Science. He replaced the first one with the Hunting and Shooting Sports Conservation Council.
· Still on a role, Trump picked Sam Clovis to be the chief scientist at the USDA. Clovis is a public climate change skeptic and — wait for it — isn’t a scientist. He’s also mostly known for hosting a talk radio show. Unless you count his degree in public administration, which, to my knowledge, isn’t exactly related to agriculture. The position has always been held by an actual scientist with subject matter expertise. But no fear, because Clovis withdrew his nomination amid his involvement with Mueller’s investigation into Russian ties to the Trump campaign.
· But Trump’s goal of destroying the USDA wasn’t over. He sent exactly no one to the USDA for a month after the election. When people did start to trickle in to the USDA, it was mainly for show. They knew very little to nothing about the agency. Or science. Many didn’t even have a college degree. They included a long-haul truck driver, a clerk at AT&T, a gas-company meter reader, a country-club cabana attendant, a Republican National Committee intern, and the owner of a scented-candle company, with skills like “pleasant demeanor” listed on their résumés. (By the way, if you’re only going to read one article in its entirety from this section, this is the one.)
· The USDA also removed inspection reports on businesses that abused animals — roadside circuses, puppy mills, research labs — from its department’s Web site. When reporters from National Geographic contacted the U.S.D.A. to ask what was going on with animal-abuse issues, “they told us all of this information was public, except now you had to FOIA it.”
· Trump’s first budget proposal included a slash to the Department of the Interior by nearly $2 Billion. This includes eliminating money for National Heritage Areas, which is important because it supports tribal preservation officers and provides grants to underrepresented communities. Another key Interior program is the Climate Action Plan, which helps vulnerable coastal communities such as Miami prepare for the impact of sea-level rise and other effects of climate change.
· Trump ordered the Interior Department to “reconsider” safety regulations on offshore drilling, which were implemented after the disastrous Deepwater Horizon oil spill and tragedy.
· Trump signed an executive order calling for Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review and reconsider national monuments created by Presidents Clinton, George W. Bush, and Obama. These monuments were set aside as public land under the 1906 Antiquities Act, which gives presidents the power to limit use of public land for historic, cultural, scientific, or other reasons. The national monuments in danger include Bears Ears, Northeast Canyons and Seamounts, Mojave Trails, Basin and Range, Berryessa Snow Mountain, Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks, Rio Grande del Norte, Mariana Trench, Pacific Remote Islands, Rose Atoll in the South Pacific Ocean, Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument (which is larger than all national parks combined), Upper Missouri River Break, Sonoran Desert, Carrizo Plain, Vermilion Cliffs, Ironwood Forest, Hanford Reach, Canyons of the Ancients, Giant Sequoia, Grand Canyon, Grand Staircase-Escalante, and San Gabriel Mountains. He also ordered a review of all national marine sanctuaries that were declared within the last ten years.
· On cue, Trump is looking into drilling off of the California coast in the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary. In addition, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke proposed opening three marine sanctuaries for commercial fishing, which include some of the rarest habitats in the country.
· Turns out, a uranium mining firm lobbied Trump to include Bears Ears so they can more easily drill and mine for uranium there so they can make more money.
· Industry lobbyists apparently have much sway, because Scott Pruitt met privately with the CEO of Dow Chemical two days before dening a petition to ban Dow’s chlorpyrifos pesticide from being sprayed on food, despite a review by his agency’s scientists that concluded ingesting even minuscule amounts of the chemical can interfere with the brain development of fetuses and infants.
· Industry lobbyists also lucked out on public lands in other capacities, particularly billionaire Andrónico Luksic, who owns a Chilean mining firm and who also happens rents a home to Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, in Washington. Trump renewed leases for a copper and nickel mining operation on the border of Minnesota’s Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, reversing a decision made in the final weeks of Barack Obama’s tenure in office.
· The Interior Department also rolled back a policy to protect migratory birdsand will no longer prosecute oil and gas, wind, and solar operators that accidentally kill birds.
· Trump halted an independent scientific study of offshore oil inspections by the federal Bureau of Safety and Environmental enforcement, which were established after the BP oil spill.
· Trump signed a number of executive orders aimed at advancing the Keystone XL and the Dakota Access pipelines, posing threats not only to the environment, but to clean water supplies and sacred tribal burial grounds. These pipelines are estimated to result in only 35 permanent jobs.
· Trump attacked wind power in a state that gets more than a third of its power from — wait for it — wind. He also used inaccurate assumptions in his inaccurate arguments, suggesting that wind energy is unreliable and bad for birds. Both untrue.
· Joel Clement is one of several whistleblower scientists who left the federal government after the Trump administration retaliated against him for publicly disclosing how climate change affects Alaska Native communities. Clement was re-assigned from his climate change science expertise position to a random accounting job for which he had no experience. The sharp deviation from real science has led to an advocacy group setting up a hotline with a law firm to help scientists raise alarms.
· Apparently, having no experience is a prerequisite for jobs in the Trump administration. A banker friend of Scott Pruitt gave Pruitt and his wife three loans for a $600K home while Pruitt’s income was $38,400. This banker friend was banned from the banking industry for life for violating laws and ethics for this and other indiscretions. Pruitt appointed him to lead the nation’s Superfund program, which is the informal name for the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), which gives the EPA the funds and authority to clean up contaminated sites.
· Trump rolled back rules regarding environmental reviews and restrictions on government-funded building projects in flood-prone areas, revoking an Obama order aimed at reducing exposure to flooding, sea level rise, and other consequences of climate change.
· House republicans introduced a bill to defund key climate research.
· Scott Pruitt said he would be issuing a new set of rules overriding the Clean Power Plan, the centerpiece of President Barack Obama’s drive to curb global climate change that limits carbon emissions.
· In defense of these new rules regarding carbon emissions, the Secretary of Energy Rick Perry said that these energy policies will Ward. Off. Sexual. Assault. Yes. He said that. With a straight face. Because sexual assault only happens in the dark. So if it’s not dark, there won’t be any. Duh.
· Against the recommendations of environmentalists and scientists, The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) moved to remove protections for pacific walruses from the Endangered Species Act. He’s also moving the Canada Lynx from the Endangered Species list, despite an assessment concluding the species will die out in its northern range by the end of the century without federal protection.
· Trump signed HJR 69 into law, which rescinded the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s 2016 Alaska National Wildlife Refuges Rule that protected native carnivores from Board of Game (BOG) predator management program. This law now allows practices such as the killing of bears with cubs and wolves with pups, as well as the hunting of animals from aircraft, among other things.
· Trump took the US out of the Paris Agreement, which an agreement within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) dealing with greenhouse gas emissions mitigation, adaptation, and finance starting in the year 2020. Syria has since signed the agreement, making the United States the only country on the planet to reject the agreement.
· Trump moved to reverse the ban on elephant trophies from Africa, which isn’t surprising considering his family is known to hop over to Africa to kill wild and endangered animals in order to mount something on their walls and post a good photo to facebook. Thankfully, someone was able to pour a drop of reason into his small brain and he finally decided to keep the ban in place.
· Trump banned officials from his agencies from using the words “vulnerable,” “entitlement,” “diversity,” “transgender,” “fetus,” “evidence-based” and “science-based.” As one example, onstead of “science-based” or “evidence-based,” the suggested phrase is “CDC bases its recommendations on science in consideration with community standards and wishes.” So, instead of science, we are now making decisions based on people’s wishes. As a researcher focusing on evidence-based programs and practices, this leaves me speechless. Here is a great summary of Trump’s attempt to hijack and censor the English language to his advantage. In addition, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention issued a “language guidance” document, which, among other things, recommends using “all youth” instead of “underserved youth,” referring to crime as a “public issue/public concern” rather than a “public health issue/public health concern,” and describing young people who commit crimes as “offenders” rather than “system-involved or justice-involved youths.” The document also says to avoid the term “substance abuse disorder” in favor of “substance abuse issue.”
· Trump is the first president in 40 years to not appoint a presidential science advisor, and as of January 2018, less than a third of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy positions are full. A report by the Union of Concerned Scientists found that Trump’s White House is abandoning science advice at unprecedented levels.
· Trump instituted a tariff on solar energy, with an anticipated result in tens of thousands of jobs lost from the sector and a huge rise in solar costs, potentially harming the US’s use of renewable energy. Almost immediately, one company announced it’s putting a hold on a $20 million plan to expand factories and create hundreds of new jobs in the U.S. until it can guarantee an exclusion from the new federal solar technology tariff.
· For the first time, China recently overtook the US in scientific research published.
· Trump is planning to request an end to funding for the International Space Station (ISS) by 2025, a move that would be a major hurdle to expanding space exploration efforts.
· As of February 1, 2018, Trump plans on asking for a 72 percent cut to the Energy Department’s renewable energy and energy efficiency programs, as well as significant staff cuts. An anonymous source suggested that Trump and Rick Perry want more funding to go toward nuclear power. This budget cut would abolish the weatherization program, which has trained thousands of workers and helped reduce utility bills for thousands of homeowners, and eliminate state energy grants. It would ax research in fuel efficient vehicles by 82 percent, bioenergy technologies by 82 percent, advanced manufacturing by 75 percent, and solar energy technology by 78 percent. The plan would also chop spending on more efficient building technologies and research into geothermal, hydro and wind power.
Next up: Women and Families
