The Trump administration is expected to formally eliminate the US government's role in controlling greenhouse gas pollution by revoking its 17-year-old scientific finding that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin will join President Donald Trump for an event focused on boosting US coal use, marking a far more radical retreat on climate change compared to Trump's first term. The move demolishes the legal underpinning of the EPA's authority to act on climate change under the Clean Air Act.

This decision not only erases President Joe Biden's most important climate regulations but is designed to make it more difficult for any future administration to rein in fossil fuel pollution from vehicles, power plants, or other industries. Climate action advocates and Democrat-led states have vowed to challenge the repeal, which comes despite scientists reporting that temperatures in the contiguous United States have increased by 2.5° F since 1970. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine stated that evidence for current and future harm to human health and welfare created by human-caused greenhouse gases is beyond scientific dispute.

The battle seems destined to land in the Supreme Court, forcing it to revisit its landmark 2007 ruling that greenhouse gases were pollutants under the Clean Air Act. With all five justices who formed the majority in that case dead or retired, the outcome of a legal challenge is by no means clear. Communities across the country will bear the brunt of this decision through dirtier air, higher health costs, and increased climate harm.