Congresswoman Chellie Pingree (D-Me) at a Press Conference Recentlly in Portland.

Congresswoman Chellie Pingree, Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Subcommittee, released the following statement today in response to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin’s formal decision to revoke the scientific determination that underpins the government’s legal authority to combat climate change:

“The EPA’s decision to rescind the Endgangerment Finding ignores decades of science and directly contradicts the Supreme Court’s landmark Massacshusetts v EPA decision, which held that greenhouse gases are pollutants under the Clean Air Act.  That ruling led to EPA’s 2009 Endangerment Finding that carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases endanger public health by fueling extreme heat, storms, wildfires and disease.

“Revoking the Endangermet Finding will kneecap the federal government’s abiilty to fight climate change — now and in the future.  By claiming that climate change poses no threat to public health, President Trump and Administrator Zeldin are making ignorance and denial the official climate policy of the US, while allowing the world’s biggest polluters to continue destroying our planet.

:Greenhouse gases released from human activities are the single biggest driver of climate change.  That’s not opinion or hyperbole.  That’s scientific fact.  To believe that extreme heat, supercharged hurricanes, crop failure and thousad-year floods aren’t threats to public health is simply delusional.  Costly and extreme weather events and disasters are already impacting millions of Americans every year.

“The EPA’s stated mission is to protect human health and the environment.”  Administrator Zeldin himself has said climate change is something we need to take seriously.  And yet almost every acation he has taken at the EPA does not take this threat seriously and will excerbate climate change and the pollution it causes.  This decision sends a clear message that the only thing this Administratdion is interesed in protecting are the interests of Big Oil, the very fossil fuel companies that are responsible for this crisis.

“Climate change is an existential threat.  Mitigating its worse impacts will require real, meaningful, and sustained collaboration between the public and private sectors — and government agencies that actually believe in climate science.  As Ranking Member of the Subcommitee that oversees funding for the EPA, I vow to do everything in my power to reinstate the Endangerment Finding — and to ensure that this vital agency has the resoucees it needs to fulfill its mission of proteting human health and the environment.”

Attorney General Aaron M. Frey issued the following statement today:  “The US Environmental Protection Agency’s disregard for the dangers of greenhouse gas emissions defies science, law and reality.  The science is clear that greenhouse gas emisions cause significant harm to public health and welfare, which is increasingly borne out in Maine by impacts including sea level rise, extreme storms flooding and disrupted coastal habitats and fisheries.  We have worked to hold the administration to responsible climate action and we will continue to advocate for regulations that confronts the climate crisis”