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May 14, 2025 - Epoch Times
29:36
The Most Comprehensive EPA Update on YouTube (probably)
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With all that's happened in the first 100 days of Trump's second term in office, it's really, you can say, easy to miss big developments from the various governmental agencies.
And so with that in mind, today I'm going to give you a comprehensive update on what the EPA has been up to in the month of April, the previous complete month.
And for a bit of context before we dive in, shortly after assuming office, President Trump nominated a man by the name of Lee Zeldin to be the new administrator of the EPA.
He was later confirmed by the Senate, and he has been in charge of the EPA since January 29th of this year.
Now, Mr. Lee Zeldin, he was previously a member of Congress for eight years out of New York, and if he looks familiar to you, that's likely because he rose to prominence as the Republican candidate for governor in New York during the 2022 election cycle.
Now, of course, he lost that election, but his career in government continued, evidenced by the fact that he is now the administrator of the EPA.
And in regards to why President Trump decided to choose Mr. Lee Zeldin to be the new EPA administrator, here is what Trump said on the matter back when the nomination process was still playing itself out.
Lee, with a very strong legal background, has been a true fighter for America First policies.
He will ensure fair and swift deregulatory decisions that will be enacted in a way to unleash the power of American businesses, while at the same time maintaining the highest environmental standards, including the cleanest air and water on the planet.
He will set new standards on environmental review and maintenance that will allow the United States to grow in a healthy and well-structured way.
And so based on that, the mandate that Mr. Lee Zeldin was given was twofold.
To protect the environment as well as to deregulate, meaning to remove red tape for American businesses.
And so keep that mandate in mind as we're going to be going through this update.
And one last thing I'll mention before we actually dive in.
Some of what the EPA has been doing is...
You could say controversial.
As just one example, we're going to be later talking about how the EPA is canceling billions of dollars worth of contracts that are related to green bank programs.
Now, the EPA is doing so because they claim that these programs are ideological in nature, they don't really help the environment, and therefore all that money can be better spent elsewhere.
However, it is worth mentioning that there are people who love these types of programs, and they say that these programs help homeowners do things like insulate their homes, which helps to fix things like mold in the house, it helps to reduce electricity costs, and without these programs, many people wouldn't be able to afford it otherwise.
And so that is just one example.
In this video, in today's episode, we're not going to be going through the nuances of every individual program that's being cut.
I'm just going to give you...
The program, the dollar amount being saved, and the reason that the EPA is giving for the cut to be made.
You can make your own decisions as to whether you think it's good or not.
And if you actually want to do your own research and go deeper into each individual program, the research links will be down in the description box below if you happen to be the type of person that likes to dig into the weeds.
And so with those caveats out of the way, let's take a moment to smash those like and subscribe buttons.
And begin to go through what the EPA has been up to in the month of April in chronological order, starting with April the 1st.
That was when Mr. Lee Zeldin posted this following statement on Twitter announcing three separate cost-saving measures that the EPA has implemented.
The first of which was the closure of something known as the EPA Museum.
Now, if you're like me...
You have never heard of this EPA museum before today.
However, it costs roughly $4 million to build, and it costs $600,000 annually to maintain.
But there appears to be no actual interest from the public for this museum.
Most people, including myself and you, have never heard of this museum, and that is reflected in the actual data in terms of the attendance numbers.
Between May of 2024 and February of 2025, exactly 1,909 visitors came to the museum.
And as a fun exercise, when you do the math, when you divide the dollar amount that it took to run the museum for that 10-month span of time, and you divide that number by the number of visitors that came, it's equivalent to roughly 260 American taxpayer dollars per visitor for the free tour.
That's how much we pay for each visitor to come and get the free tour.
Now, in terms of what this museum actually looks like, here's what Lee Zeldin said while giving a short tour of the museum during an interview over on Fox News.
We're in a one room that is less than 1,600 square feet.
You'll see all sorts of time missing.
You might remember during this period between 2014 and 2021, there was a Trump presidency.
Yeah, they just conveniently leave that out of the timeline.
Now, come over here.
It's a lot about climate change and environmental justice.
And notice the only emissions that they're even going to talk about here is carbon dioxide.
No reference to anything that is good and necessary about carbon dioxide.
Here's the shot of the entire museum.
This is everything.
Four million dollars to build this.
I don't even know how the heck they need to spend four million dollars for this one room.
Now, coming over here, another tribute to environmental justice.
And what's amazing is that over the course of this last administration, all this talk about environmental justice and climate change, it was really to justify giving out tens of billions of dollars to their friends through self-dealing, conflicts of interest, unqualified recipients.
We're shutting this museum down.
The taxpayer wins enough of this partial biased EPA history.
And so the museum has now been shuttered, saving the U.S. taxpayers roughly $600,000 per year.
The second cost-cutting measure that Mr. Lee Zeldin announced on April 1st over on Twitter was the consolidation of office space.
Specifically, the EPA said that they will be relinquishing their leased space in the Ronald Reagan building located in Washington, D.C. by the end of the year.
And by doing so, they're going to be saving roughly 18 million dollars Now, in their statement where they announced this consolidation of office space, here's what they wrote.
Quote, And then, just for your general reference...
As we mentioned in a previous episode, the General Services Administration has actually been selling a lot of federal real estate that's no longer being used by the government, meaning that the former EPA office space might come into the market next fiscal year.
So if you're looking for office space, look out for that.
Then the last thing that Mr. Lee Zeldin announced on April 1st was the cancellation of $22 billion worth of DEI grants as well as environmental justice contracts.
Now, these cancellations are, you can say, in line with the Trump administration's broader agenda to cut down on DEI and climate change-related contracts and programs.
But, much like the cuts at other agencies, this $22 billion cut by the EPA is being met with legal resistance.
For instance, part of the $22 billion in canceled contracts has to do with the aforementioned Green Bank program.
And here's how that's playing out.
Quote.
Last year, under the Biden administration, the EPA transferred $14 billion to Citibank to administer the Green Bank Program, which Congress authorized in 2022 to expand financing for renewable energy and zero-carbon buildings and transportation.
The bank is also responsible for running a second greenhouse gas reduction fund program aimed at non-profit lenders in low-income communities.
All of those accounts have been frozen since at least February 18th.
Meaning that on February 18th, the EPA froze those funds, the funds that they've already transferred to Citibank to be dispersed out to these different green companies.
And as you can imagine, those companies aren't happy.
The article continues.
Power Forward Communities, which was awarded $2 billion in greenhouse gas reduction fund money last year, filed suit on Tuesday afternoon in a U.S. district court in New York where Citibank is headquartered.
The group uses the money to run an energy efficiency program for housing.
Now, just for your general reference, Power Forward Communities was the third one of these companies to file a lawsuit against the EPA for freezing this $22 billion tranche of funds.
The lawsuit is currently playing itself out in court awaiting appeal.
We'll see how it plays out, but in the meantime, the $22 billion still does remain frozen.
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Moving along.
On April 7th, the EPA announced the cancellation of a Biden-era policy which penalized states for air pollution that came from outside the borders of the United States of America.
Now, this particular policy change does take a bit of explaining.
In the U.S., we have something called the Clean Air Act.
It was first passed into law in the year 1963, and this law ostensibly limits air pollution throughout the whole country.
And included as a part of this law is Section 179B, which says that if an American state or an American city has air pollution which is coming from another country, that state or that city will not be punished for it.
And obviously, this section is very important for states on the border.
The states that border Mexico and Canada, because they might have air pollution problems coming from across the border that they can do nothing about.
However, the question then becomes, how does a state or a city prove that their air pollution is coming from another country?
And that's where the EPA guidance comes in.
Many years ago, the EPA set up a protocol for states to be able to use to make the determination that the air pollution in their state However, according to several state governments, including the governments of Utah and Arizona, this EPA guidance was difficult to apply, and it was difficult for states to be able to demonstrate that foreign air pollution was what was harming Americans.
That's a very simplified explanation, but basically...
That is the general backstory for this new announcement from the EPA, which you can see up on your screen, which rescinded this guidance on Section 179b.
Specifically, while he was physically in Utah, Lee Zeldin released a statement saying the following, quote, Americans should not be harmed by other countries that do not have the same environmental standards we have in the United States.
Today's announcement is a step in the right direction.
Not only are we eliminating cumbersome red tape that placed excessive burden on states to prove emissions were from an international source, but we are also helping states across our nation prosper while ensuring they continue to provide clean air for the red tape.
And then, also on April 7th, and also in Utah, Mr. Lee Zeldin announced that the EPA is launching a review on the presence of fluoride in U.S. drinking water.
That's interesting because, if you didn't know, Utah is the first state in the nation to ban the use of fluoride in their drinking water.
And that is, by the way, a much longer topic that we are making a separate episode on.
But here I'm just mentioning that the EPA is launching a review on the most recent scientific literature on this particular topic, on fluoride in U.S. drinking water.
Actually, the very next day, on April 8th, the EPA followed up on the Florida announcement with a statement from Mr. Lee Zeldin.
Here's specifically what it said.
Quote, Without prejudging any outcomes, when this evaluation is completed, we will have an updated foundational scientific evaluation that will inform the agency's future steps to meet statutory obligations under the Save Drinking Water Act.
Secretary Kennedy, meaning RFK Jr., has long been at the forefront of this issue.
His advocacy was instrumental in our decision to review fluoride exposure risks, and we are committed to working alongside him, utilizing sound science as we advance our mission of protecting human health and the environment.
Then, moving along, the next day, which was April 9th, Mr. Lee Zeldin informed the American public that there was a Mexican sewage spill of roughly 6 million gallons of sewage into the Tijuana River.
Here's specifically where he wrote, quote, The EPA was notified of a spill of Mexican sewage at the U.S. border.
Roughly 6 million gallons entered the Tijuana River over the last two days.
Mexico is stating that their pump station, Scylla, will be activated to fully capture leakage headed to the U.S. tomorrow.
Mexico has further communicated that they are working to complete their international collector repair by this weekend.
I look forward to personally visiting this area of the border in just under two weeks.
Decades of raw sewage entering the U.S.A.
needs to permanently end once and for all.
Now, let's put a pin in this whole Mexican sewage situation because we will get back to that later on in the video.
For now, however, let's move along to April the 10th.
That was when Mr. Lee Zeldin published an op-ed in the New York Post where he basically berated the EPA under the Biden administration for using taxpayer dollars to fund left-wing activist groups.
Basically, the op-ed served as his justification for canceling those $22 billion worth of contracts that we mentioned earlier, and he gave some specific examples of why those particular contracts were canceled.
Included among the examples was this one here.
Many American communities are suffering with serious unresolved environmental issues.
But under the environmental justice banner, the previous administration's EPA showered billions on ideological allies instead of directing those resources into solving environmental problems and making meaningful change.
Take, for example, a group called Climate Justice Alliance, which argues that environmental justice travels through a free Palestine.
The Biden administration tossed Climate Change Alliance an obscene award of $50 million to confront the legacy of environmental harms, not to take any action related to cleaning America's air, land, and water.
In fact, that was $50 million fewer dedicated to protecting our environment.
I canceled this grant as soon as I was confirmed.
He gave several of these sorts of examples, and if you actually want to read the entire New York Post op-ed, I will throw a link to it.
You'll be able to find it down in the description box below.
Moving along, however, on April the 14th, Lee Zeldin announced that the EPA has cut two years off of their timeline for the cleanup of the Westlake landfill.
Here's specifically what he said.
Now, The specific history of this particular environmental disaster probably deserves its own episode.
But in short, back in 1973, you had atomic waste from the Manhattan Project, from all those nuclear test programs.
It was illegally dumped into this landfill in Missouri.
Now naturally, this radioactive waste contaminated both the landfill as well as some of the surrounding area in St. Louis.
Then, 17 years later, in the year 1990, this landfill was designated as a Superfund site.
Now for your reference, Superfund site is a term that's used by the EPA to designate an area that's been contaminated by hazardous waste that needs to be cleaned up because it poses a risk to both human health as well as the environment.
Essentially, the superfund is federal money that's used for the cleanup when the EPA cannot find the responsible party to hold accountable.
But, you might be asking yourself, if this landfill was set up as a superfund site all the way back in the year 1990, why has nothing been done yet?
And the answer is, unfortunately, rather simple.
It is government efficiency at its finest.
There are currently over 1,300 active Superfund sites across the whole country, and they're all battling for the same funding.
And so, just because something was designated does not mean that it just immediately receives the money.
Which projects actually get funding in a given year has a lot to do with how local politicians push their priorities for their home states at the national level.
And perfectly along that line, you had Senator Josh Hawley from the great state of Missouri.
He was able to successfully lobby the EPA to speed up the cleanup on the Westlake landfill.
And on April 14th, which is the same day that the EPA made their announcement of this accelerated timeline, Josh Hawley himself released a statement saying the following, quote, Which is, of course, great for the people of St. Louis, but it does make you wonder, how many of these remaining...
1,300 Superfund sites could be fixed up with the $22 billion that the EPA is going to be saving by canceling those different grants and contracts.
I think that would be a very interesting question to raise to Mr. Lee Zeldin if I ever get a chance to interview him.
And if I ever do interview him, I'll ask him that question for sure.
Regardless, moving along to April 15th, that was when Mr. Lee Zeldin published an open letter to the leadership of a company called Make Sunsets informing them that the EPA is launching an investigation into their company's actions.
Now, for your reference, Make Sunsets is a geoengineering organization that injects sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere in order to cool the earth.
They also offer something called cooling credits, which is a concept...
Similar to something you probably know of as carbon credits.
However, according to this letter from Mr. Lee Zeldin, the company's actions are now facing investigatory scrutiny from the EPA.
Here's what the letter said.
And again, this letter is written by Lee Zeldin as the administrator of the EPA, addressing the leadership of this particular company.
Quote, The United States Environmental Protection Agency, the EPA, is evaluating whether Make Sunset is subject to the Clean Air Act by adversely impacting He then informed the company that they have 30 days to provide a host of company documents to the EPA to aid in this investigation.
We then skipped several days, and on April 17th...
The EPA released a statement on Twitter from Lee Zeldin regarding Make Sunsets.
Here's what it said.
And for your reference, we will be following up on this investigation.
Moving along, though, to April 19th, that was when Lee Zeldin traveled down to Midland, Texas, alongside Senator Ted Cruz, in order to tour several oil and gas plants.
And this was basically the EPA showing public support for the oil and gas industry, which was a marked change from the, you can say, more adversarial relationship between the two during the prior administration.
Moving along, though, on the 22nd, which happened to be Earth Day, Lee Zeldin traveled down to San Diego to meet with his counterparts in the Mexican government.
Now, the purpose of this meeting was to address this long-standing issue where Mexican sewage systems are so overburdened, and specifically in recent years with all the migrants traveling to the U.S., that they spew waste, it runs off into the Pacific Ocean, and then travels to the shores of California.
This raw sewage, it then winds up polluting the waters of San Diego.
Here's specifically what Lee Selden said, speaking on this issue down in San Diego on 22nd, which is, again, Earth Day.
This visit for EPA.
It's very important for us to make sure that we aren't just seeing and hearing firsthand on the ground in Southern California, but ensuring that the path forward is one of max collaboration and extreme urgency to end a crisis that should have ended a long time ago.
It's a beautiful day where people should be able to spend an Earth Day not worrying about foul smells in the air, Tijuana Valley degradation, public health, beach closures, and so much more.
But that's the reality that Americans And there is indeed hard data to back up his claims.
For instance, quote: And also, besides impacting American civilians, the sewage is also affecting our military readiness.
By putting our elite operators at risk.
You see, San Diego is the home of the U.S. Navy SEAL's West Coast based of operations.
They do a lot of their training there, which naturally involves training in water.
But because of the sewage coming in from Mexico, both the actual U.S. Navy SEALs, as well as the U.S. Navy SEAL prospects who are being trained in San Diego, they're getting sick from wastewater exposure.
Quote, A report from the Office of the Inspector General at the Department of Defense found that the Mexican sewage contamination exceeded state safety levels in over 75% of tested samples.
The report said that 39% of recent Navy Special Forces cases of acute gastrointestinal illness were tied to exposure to waters contaminated beyond state safety standards.
With 75% of Naval Special Warfare water training sessions deemed too difficult to cancel or relocate, the Office of the Inspector General recommended that training be relocated, rescheduled, or canceled when bacteria levels exceed state health standards.
You then go to the next day, which was April 23rd, and that was when Mr. Lee Zeldin appeared on a local Fox affiliate in San Diego to highlight the EPA's plan to 100% fix this Mexican sewage problem.
Here's a short clip from that interview.
When you say 100% plan, 100% solution, what is this?
What does it look like?
So, a few things.
One is there's still $88 million remaining on Mexico's obligation towards border projects on the Mexican side.
We're asking Mexico to obligate that remaining funds.
We are going to send EPA employees to the San Antonio de los Buenos plant to look at operations there.
I spoke about treating the effluents with chemicals to eliminate bacteria.
That was part of it.
We're just discussing the diversion of 10 million gallons per day.
I mentioned the idea of a large outflow pipe into the ocean to get the outflow further away from the shore.
Planning for population growth.
The stormwater runoff with new construction.
All of this came up Monday evening.
All of this is going to be part of that 100% solution that we are going to finish crafting over the course of today.
Maybe it's finished tomorrow, but we want to get it done imminently.
We want to get to the Mexico side right away, and we want their feedback instantly.
Then, moving along to April 28th, that was when the EPA announced an emergency fuel waiver.
Now, this fuel waiver comes ahead of the summer driving season, and it allows for the sale of E15 gasoline.
Now, for your reference, normal gasoline, the stuff you normally get from the pump, is E10, meaning it's 10% ethanol, 90% gasoline.
However, E15 is 15% ethanol, 85% gasoline.
Now, the benefits of E15 is that it's cheaper, it's better for American corn farmers because it creates demand for their products, the ethanol comes from the corn, and generally it's believed to create fewer greenhouse gas emissions compared to regular gas.
However, the downside is that, ironically, it creates more smog in the form of ground-level ozone.
And so there are both pluses and minuses to using this particular gas.
And for your reference, it's approved for most cars and SUVs that are from 2001 or later, but E15 is not approved for motorcycles, lawn equipment, or boats.
And so just be careful this summer when you're filling up.
Also, it's worth mentioning that on that very same day, on April 28th, the EPA announced several actions that they're going to be taking to reduce Americans' exposure to PFAS, otherwise known as forever chemicals.
Now, we've done several deep dive episodes in the past regarding these PFAS chemicals, but in short, these chemicals are called forever chemicals because they don't naturally break down in either water or soil, and therefore...
Once they're in the environment, they remain there forever, or at least for thousands of years.
If you'd like to go deeper into how these PFAS chemicals actually got into our environment, as well as the dangers that they present to the human body, as well as especially children, I'll throw the links to our earlier episodes.
You'll be able to find them down in the description box below.
Moving forward, though, the EPA released a short list of actions that they're going to be taking to address these PFAS chemicals.
They are as follows.
Designate an agency leader for dealing with PFAS within the EPA.
Implement a PFAS testing strategy under the Toxic Substances Control Act.
Create guidelines to stop certain forever chemicals from entering drinking water systems, which I'm shocked has not already been in place.
set up a liability framework so that polluters have to pay, update the PFAS destruction and disposal guidance annually rather than every three years, which is what they do now, among other actions that they're planning to take.
Then, alongside that list, Lee Zeldin actually released a statement regarding these PFAS chemicals, saying the following, quote, This is just a start of the work we will do on PFAS to ensure Americans have the cleanest air, land, and water.
And then lastly, on April 30th...
To coincide with Trump's 100 first days in office, the EPA released a list of the 100 environmental actions that they've taken since January 20th to protect people's health as well as to protect the environment.
Now, most of the nationwide actions were actually covered in today's episode.
But that list also included dozens of examples at the state and regional level where you had the EPA helping to clean up environmental disasters and or addressing local longstanding issues.
We're not going to be going through all of the items on that list because it covers the first three months of the administration, whereas our episode today is only covering April.
But if you'd like to go through that list for yourself, I'll throw a link to it.
You'll be able to find it down in the description box below if you want to see that full list of 100.
And so, there you have it.
A full update of what the EPA has been up to in the month of April.
If you'd like to go through the details of anything that we mentioned, again, all those links will be down in the description box below if you want to dive deeper into the weeds.
And also, please do leave your comments.
Do you agree with what Lee Zeldin is doing over at the EPA?
Do you agree with his methodology and the way that he's enacting the policies?
Do you agree with the green bank programs being cut?
Or do you think that green bank programs are beneficial and should be put into place?
And or do you think that there's a way to do these green bank programs while cutting out some of the more ideological elements that Lee Zeldin was highlighting in that op-ed in the New York Post?
Leave your thoughts in the comments section below.
I'd love to know what you're thinking.
And also, again, if you appreciate content like this, do smash that like button so this reaches ever more people via the YouTube algorithm.
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And then, until next time, I'm your host, Roman from The Epoch Times.
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