Safeguarding the EPA while Building Power for Environmental Health and Justice

In its first week, the new administration has stocked the Environmental Protection Agency with oil; gas; and chemical industry lobbyists, paused disbursement of billions of dollars of federal funding for climate and community health solutions; and issued a string of directives aimed at decimating environmental justice programs and intimidating the federal workforce.

Project 2025, the administration hopes to weaken the EPA to the point that it is fundamentally broken; lacking core capacity and staffing to bounce back in the future. This agenda threatens to roll back decades of progress on public health; environmental justice; and climate change and to put millions of Americans’ health at risk from exposure to increased levels of toxic pollution.

 

Speakers:

Janet McCabe

Janet McCabe was the Deputy Administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency under President Biden. Before that role, she spent seven years working as Acting Assistant Administrator and Principal Deputy to the Assistant Administrator in the Office of Air and Radiation under President Barack Obama.  Before rejoining EPA, Janet was a Professor of Practice at the Indiana University McKinney School of Law and Director of the IU Environmental Resilience Institute.  

Dr. Jalonne White-Newsome (Moderator)

Dr. Jalonne White-Newsome recently served in the Biden-Harris Administration as the first ever Federal Chief Environmental Justice Officer, where she led efforts to advance the most ambitious environmental justice agenda the United States has ever seen.  Previously, she was the first Climate and Health post-doctoral fellow at the Union of Concerned Scientists and the first Director of Federal Policy at WE ACT for Environmental Justice.  She is now the CEO/Founder of Empowering a Green Environment and Economy, LLC.

Jeremy Symons

Jeremy Symons is a Senior Advisor at Environmental Protection Network, a non-partisan alliance of 650 former EPA officials dedicated to improving the capability of environmental agencies to serve all communities. Jeremy is also a consultant who helps philanthropies pursue high-impact climate and environmental strategies. Most recently, he led efforts to assemble the powerful big tent coalition that successfully pushed the Biden administration to pause LNG export permits. Previously, he was Vice President of Political Affairs at Environmental Defense Fund, Deputy Democratic Staff Director for the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, Senior Vice President at National Wildlife Federation, and Climate Advisor at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Date

Feb 06 2025
Expired!

Time

2:00 pm - 3:15 pm
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