Regs Talk: The CSS Blog
Blogs are authored by CSS members and policy experts, and have been reprinted with permission.
Groundhog Day for Gray Wolves, Endangered Species
By Nora Apter, Natural Resources Defense Council In case Congress needs reminding, we are currently facing a devastating sixth mass extinction. It’s estimated that one in six species will be extinct by the end of the century. The last thing our leaders in government should be doing is working to undermine our most effective law for protecting […]
Crash Books
By Bartlett Naylor, Public Citizen Ten years ago, Wall Street crashed the economy. After a 1999 deregulation law allowed risky investment banks to speculate with the cheap money held by taxpayer-backed insured banks, Wall Street went wild. Reckless, fraudulent conduct inflated a housing bubble whose rupture meant ruin for millions of Americans. People lost their […]
VICTORY! Yellowstone Grizzlies Saved from Trophy Hunts; Endangered Species Protections Restored
By Bonnie Rice, Sierra Club Yesterday, the bears won. Just days before a second temporary restraining order was set to expire, Judge Dana Christensen ruled in favor of Tribal Nations and conservationists in reinstating Yellowstone grizzlies’ Endangered Species protections, saving them from Wyoming and Idaho’s trophy hunts. His decision stated that the federal government had […]
Public Hearings Show Broad Opposition to Clean Cars Rollback
By Luke Tonachel, Natural Resources Defense Council The Trump administration is moving to gut pollution and fuel economy standards for cars and trucks, and this week a broad collection of physicians, labor representatives, innovative business owners, environmental advocates and mothers and grandmothers stepped up to urge them to drop this terrible idea. At public hearings […]
Who’s Clamoring for More Methane in the Atmosphere?
By Ross Sherman, Environment America In today’s national political climate, it can seem that everything — no matter how big or small — is controversial. But here’s an idea that isn’t: our environment is worth protecting. I’m willing to bet, whether you’re talking to someone from Maine, Alabama, Texas, California, or anywhere else in the country, nearly everyone would […]
A Lot of Small Deregulation Can Add Up to Significant Rollbacks
By Better Markets A financial deregulation bill recently signed by President Trump ended many of the key financial protection rules on 21 of the 40 biggest banks in the country, those with $100-$250 billion in assets. On top of that legislative deregulation, there has been significant and broad-based deregulation at the financial agencies, from the Federal Reserve […]
Statistics, Schmatistics: SEC Enforcement Chief Rejects Numbers, Dollars as Metric for Corporate Enforcement
By Rick Claypool, Public Citizen What’s the best day way to figure out whether the government is doing a good job of cracking down on lawbreaking companies? If you ask the current bosses at one federal regulator, it isn’t the number of cases, or the total amount of fines. Nope. According to Stephanie Avakian, who co-directs […]
Trump Administration Is Targeting Immigrant Communities, Yet Again
By Diali Avila, National Women’s Law Center This weekend, the Administration announced that it plans to publish a proposed rule that would change longstanding rules for immigrants wanting to enter the United States or change their status to Legal Permanent Resident (LPR or better known as a “green card”). The rule would change the public charge […]
Green For All Mobilizes Central Valley Residents to Speak Out for Clean Air, Clean Cars
By Green for All Dozens of Central Valley residents put off work and other commitments to testify Monday at the U.S. EPA hearing on the “Safer Affordable Fuel-Efficient Vehicles Rule”, a proposal put forth by the Trump Administration to weaken clean car standards (despite the misleading name). The Latino community in particular, turned out in […]
EPA Resists Court Order to Protect Kids’ Health
By Natural Resources Defense Council A federal court ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to finalize the ban on the toxic pesticide chlorpyrifos last month, but the EPA is now asking the court to reconsider its decision. “The Trump administration is shameless in its refusal to ban this dangerous chemical that is poisoning our children’s brains,” says Erik Olson, […]
Action Needed to Address the US Military’s PFAS Contamination
By Derrick Jackson, Union of Concerned Scientists There was dead silence at a community meeting last week in Portsmouth, New Hampshire after Nancy Eaton spoke before a panel of top federal health officials planning a study of per- and polyfluoroalkyl (PFAS) contamination at the former Pease Air Force Base. She described how her husband David, […]
EPA Won’t Protect Our Kids. Will California?
By Allison Johnson and Miriam Rotkin-Ellman, Natural Resources Defense Council This summer, a federal court offered the new head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Andrew Wheeler, a chance to right one of Scott Pruitt’s wrongs: ban the dangerous pesticide chlorpyrifos. Instead, Wheeler has chosen to fight to keep this dangerous pesticide in the fields and on our food, at […]
PFAS Contamination at Military Sites Reveals a Need for Urgent Science-Based Protections
By Genna Reed, Union of Concerned Scientists A new UCS factsheet released today looks at PFAS contamination at military bases, revealing that many of the sites have levels of these chemicals in their drinking or groundwater at potentially unsafe levels. PFAS, or poly- and perfluorinated alkyl substances, have been used in everything from Teflon pans, […]
Along With Flooding, Hurricane Florence Unleashes Toxic Coal Ash
By Jessica Knoblauch, Earthjustice As Hurricane Florence floods the Carolinas, a long-buried coal industry secret is rising to the surface. Across the country, giant pits filled with millions of tons of coal ash — a toxic byproduct of burning coal — are leaking. And in the storm-pummeled Southeast, the toxic waste is spreading with the […]
Ten Years After the Wall Street Crash, It’s Time to Restore Glass-Steagall
By Craig Sandler, Public Citizen Ten years ago the financial world experienced a meltdown that brought on a Great Recession so devastating many Americans have still not fully recovered from it. Starting with the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers on September 15, 2008—the largest bankruptcy filing in U.S. history—one financial institution after another collapsed, and with them […]
From Surviving to Thriving — The National Environmental Policy Act and Disasters
By Joel Mintz, Center for Progressive Reform In August, 2017, Hurricanes Harvey and Irma brought widespread devastation to the southeastern United States, destroying buildings, flooding neighborhoods, and taking lives. Harvey shattered the national rainfall record for a single storm, dropping over 50 inches of rain in a 36-hour period. The Houston area suffered massive flooding, as the U.S. […]
From Surviving to Thriving — Hazardous Waste and Disaster Preparedness
By Victor Flatt and Joel Mintz, Center for Progressive Reform What Happened According to the Houston Chronicle, there were more than 100 releases of hazardous substances into land, air, and water during and after Hurricane Harvey. At least one dozen of the Superfund sites listed in or near Houston were flooded during the storm. On September 3, 2017, […]
The Department of Interior Does Not Care What You Think About Endangered Species
By Michael Halpern, Union of Concerned Scientists The Department of Interior simultaneously announced three majorly flawed proposals that would radically transform how the Endangered Species Act functions and gave the public just 60 days to provide feedback. Yesterday, without providing any reasoning, the department denied a request from UCS to extend the comment period. That means you have six […]
Four Key Findings in Better Markets Poll
By Better Markets As the country marks the 10th anniversary of the Lehman Brothers failure and the beginning of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, new polling commissioned by Better Markets, conducted by The Harris Poll, shows the American people are strongly opposed to the recent rollback of bank regulations, want to hear more from […]
What’s for Dinner? A Preview of the People, Process, and Politics Updating Federal Dietary Guidelines
By Sarah Reinhardt, Union of Concerned Scientists Months behind schedule, two federal departments have officially kicked off the process for writing the 2020-2025 iteration of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. Updated and reissued every five years, these guidelines are the nation’s most comprehensive and authoritative set of nutrition recommendations. And although the process is meant to […]