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Dear NRDC Activist,
A few weeks back, we promised we’d file suit to stop the Trump administration’s new policy that guts the landmark National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Well, we’ve done it.
Last week, a coalition of environmental justice and environmental groups — represented by NRDC attorneys and joined by other civil rights and environmental organizations — sued the Trump administration over its attempt to roll back NEPA.
NEPA is a critical part of our democracy that requires thorough environmental reviews and public input before major federal projects — including dangerous fossil fuel infrastructure — can be approved. It protects the people’s right to speak out against the destructive influence of polluters and hazardous projects that poison communities today and lock us into the climate crisis for decades to come.
The Trump administration’s rollback would eliminate environmental reviews for too many projects, erode government transparency, and thwart public participation.
The courts are our best bet at stopping the Trump administration from gutting this landmark environmental protection. So NRDC rushed to court to defend NEPA alongside environmental justice organizations from around the country, including:
Our litigation partners also include Sierra Club, National Audubon Society, and the New York Civil Liberties Union.
Be sure to visit the websites of our partners to find out more about their critical work.
And read all about the Trump administration’s disastrous NEPA rollback and what NRDC and our allies are doing to stop it at NRDC.org.
Trump’s rollback is a clear example of environmental racism.
Weakening of NEPA will most directly impact low-income communities and BIPOC communities, who have long faced disproportionate levels of pollution due to industrial facilities placed in or near their neighborhoods.
These are the same communities who have been hit the hardest by the COVID-19 crisis, which is especially critical as preliminary research shows that long-term exposure to air pollution is associated with higher death rates from the coronavirus.
Predictably, Trump has decided to double-down on exposing them to dangerous pollution and continued health risks. NRDC, our partners in the lawsuit, and our allies across the movement, will do everything in our power to stop attacks on NEPA.
Find out more about Trump’s disastrous attack on NEPA at NRDC.org and from the original email we sent you below.
Earlier this year, NRDC and our sister organization, the NRDC Action Fund, submitted over 100,000 public comments — alongside nearly half a million more from green and environmental justice groups — opposing Trump’s NEPA rollback.
Now, we’ll continue the fight to save NEPA in the courts, alongside our important litigation partners from across the country.
This is NRDC’s 121st lawsuit against the Trump administration — and we’ve won nearly 90% of the cases that have been resolved — an astounding record of success fighting back against illegal actions by this president that harm our environment and public health. And we’re confident that with this lawsuit, we will prevail again.
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BREAKING: Trump Silences the Public to Help Polluters
The Trump administration is trying to gut a landmark environmental law to silence us from having a voice against disastrous polluting projects like pipelines, coal mines, highways, and incinerators in our communities.
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Dear NRDC Activist,
While America faces the crises of the COVID-19 pandemic and its history of racism and inequity, President Trump is pushing ahead with an anti-environmental assault that would exacerbate both challenges in one fell-swoop.
The Trump administration just finalized its disastrous rollback of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) — a landmark law that empowers people to make their voices heard about hazardous projects in their communities and stop pollution in their own backyards.
This attack on NEPA is an attack on democracy, our environment, our climate, and YOUR voice.
And NRDC will respond immediately, taking the Trump administration to court if that's what it takes to stop this reckless assault on one of the pillars of environmental law. And we couldn't respond so effectively without the support of NRDC supporters like you — thank you.
Get all the facts about Trump's harmful attacks on NEPA, and how NRDC and our allies and partners are fighting back, and more at NRDC.org.
If Trump's NEPA rollback is allowed to stand, disastrous polluting projects — like coal mines, highways, incinerators, oil and gas drilling operations, and pipelines — could be expedited with little-to-no environmental review, public input, or analysis of long-term impacts on the environment, our climate, or the people who live near these projects.
Make no mistake: this rollback is a clear attempt to silence people and make it easier for industry to pollute our communities.
And it will further marginalize low-income communities, Black communities, Indigenous communities, and communities of color who already suffer disproportionately from the adverse health impacts of industrial pollution — and who have been hit the hardest by the COVID-19 crisis. This is especially critical as preliminary health studies suggest that long-term exposure to air pollution is associated with higher death rates from the coronavirus.
NEPA gives people the right to weigh in before a highway project tears up their neighborhood or a pipeline goes through their backyard. Steamrolling their concerns will mean more polluted air, more contaminated water, more health threats, and more environmental destruction — and it will encourage the government to ignore how massive polluting projects contribute to climate change.
We must — and will — do everything in our power to stop the Trump administration's rollback and save NEPA, including fighting back in federal court if necessary.
This dangerous new rollback comes weeks after another sweeping executive order that prods administration officials to ram through polluting projects without public notice, let alone adequate environmental reviews.
And it comes amid an onslaught of other Trump administration rollbacks over the past few months — including a move that could allow industrial polluters to evade penalties if they unlawfully fail to monitor and report on their pollution during the coronavirus crisis.
NRDC is fighting many of these rollbacks in court — just as we'll fight to save NEPA as well, if that's what it takes. NRDC has filed 118 lawsuits against the Trump administration. With the law on our side, we've won nearly 90 percent of the cases resolved so far.
Thank you for standing with us at this critical moment.
Sincerely,
Sharon Buccino
Senior Director, Land Division, NRDC 
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