WASHINGTON — More than 270 employees of the Environmental Protection Agency signed a letter Monday denouncing what they described as the Trump administration’s efforts to politicize, dismantle and sideline the main federal agency tasked with protecting the environment and public health.
The letter to President Donald Trump’s EPA administrator, Lee Zeldin, was a remarkable rebuke of the agency’s political leadership. It followed a similar missive sent this month by more than 60 employees of the National Institutes of Health, who criticized orders they saw as illegal and unethical.
“EPA employees join in solidarity with employees across the federal government in opposing this administration’s policies, including those that undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment,” the EPA workers wrote.
Asked for comment, EPA spokesperson Carolyn Holran wrote in an email: “The Trump EPA will continue to work with states, tribes and communities to advance the agency’s core mission of protecting human health and the environment and Administrator Zeldin’s Powering the Great American Comeback Initiative, which includes providing clean air, land and water for EVERY American.”
The four-page document outlined five overarching concerns with the Trump administration’s approach to the EPA. The top complaint was that decisions had been made based on a political agenda, not on science and the law.
“I’ve never seen this kind of partisanship, even in the first Trump administration,” said Justin Chen, an environmental engineer in the EPA’s Dallas-based Region 6 office who signed the letter. Chen emphasized that he was speaking in his personal capacity and not on behalf of his EPA office.
Of the 278 EPA employees who signed the letter, 173 signed their names, while 105 signed anonymously for fear of retaliation.
“We have EPA employees who are signing their full names, their offices, their regions, all of that,” Delawalla continued. “These are people who feel that this is so important that they’re willing to risk their careers to make sure that this information gets out to the public.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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