The Trump administration is currently bragging about taking a proverbial sledgehammer to our health and economy. The recent attacks on both life-saving health and climate protections will cost money as well as lives. Let’s take a look at Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt’s and President Trump’s recent absurd transgressions.

They have declined to ban chlorpyrifos, a dangerous pesticide; taken steps to roll back clean car standards; removed “science” from the EPA Office of Science and Technology’s mission statement; initiated the process to repeal the life-saving Clean Power Plan, which sets the first-ever federal limits on carbon pollution from power plants; denied that carbon pollution is the primary driver of climate change; begun dismantling the Clean Water Rule; withdrawn the U.S. from the Paris climate agreement; proposed cutting the EPA’s budget by 31 percent – and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

According to the Trump administration, their unrelenting attacks on environmental and health protections amount to “reducing unnecessary regulatory burdens,” but in reality, they are a clear attempt to put the profits of polluters before the health of American families. President Trump is quite clearly placing special interests before our health and our economy, and Maine, a state that relies so heavily on our environment, cannot sit idly by while this occurs.

Jessica Shvakhman

South Portland