Oh Well!! EPA Dismisses All Members Of Advisory Panels On Science And Clean Air

All members of the Environmental Protection Agency’s boards of outside advisers on science and clean air were dismissed in a letter emailed late Tuesday, an unusual step the Trump administration said was aimed at depoliticizing the panels. Panel members expressed disappointment and confusion at the assertion in the letter signed by James Payne, a career EPA attorney Trump installed as acting administrator. Critics charged the Trump administration with politicizing the process by eliminating the current independent advisers and clearing the way for them to be replaced with hand-picked appointees. “This is not about good governance, this is about rigging the system for polluters; corruption at the expense of the American people,” said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, the ranking Democrat on the Committee on Environment and Public Works.

Similar efforts to remake science advisory panels came during the first Trump administration, with EPA leaders changing the eligibility rules for serving on boards. The result was fewer university researchers on the panels and more industry consultants and scientists who were supportive of Trump’s deregulatory efforts, like University of Alabama in Huntsville atmospheric scientist John Christy, taking seats.

A number of the now-dismissed panel members had two to three years remaining in their terms. It was not immediately clear who would be appointed as replacements on the advisory panels, both of which are required under federal law. Trump’s choice to head up the Environmental Protection Agency, former New York Congressman Lee Zeldin, won Senate confirmation on Wednesday, the day after the dismissals.

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H. Christopher Frey, an associate dean at North Carolina State University who served as head of EPA’s Office of Research and Development during the Biden administration, said the circumstances are entirely different now. “This is really just a flat-out purge of the current membership,” he said. Frey said the Trump administration seemed to be following the conservative policy platform Project 2025, which called for “resetting science advisory boards” at EPA.

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https://insideclimatenews.org/news/29012025/trump-epa-dismisses-agency-science-advisers/