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A project of Common Dreams

For Immediate Release
Contact: Brendan Smith,Email:,brendan@bsmith.org

Let's Fight for the Energy and Jobs Program We Really Need

Trump Energy Policies Miss the Boat on Jobs and Climate

The Labor Network for Sustainability (LNS) released a briefing paper today critiquing the Trump administration's energy policies a day after the release of the "Energy Independence Executive Order". Among other things the order directs the EPA to rewrite the Clean Power Plan and "requests that the Council on Environmental Quality rescind the National Environmental Quality Policy Act guidance on greenhouse gases that required all agencies to consider the impacts of climate change in their environmental permitting process for covered actions".
Trump claims that "The previous administration devalued workers with their policies. We can protect the environment while providing people with work." The Executive Order follows Trump's "America First Energy Plan", released the day of his inauguration. It presented policies it said would "stimulate our economy, ensure our security, and protect our health" and thereby provide "a brighter future." Trump has promised that his energy policy will create "many millions of high-paying jobs."

"The Trump Energy Plan and the Executive Order completely miss the boat on jobs and climate, and his policies are actually the ones that devalue workers," says LNS researcher and writer Jeremy Brecher, "Renewable energy jobs have been growing at a rate of 20% per year. Wind and solar are creating jobs 12 times faster than the rest of the U.S. economy. Energy efficiency directly employs nearly 2,200,000 Americans and that number is expected to grow. Investing in a clean energy future makes sense not just from an environmental but a jobs standpoint."

LNS' briefing paper: "Trump's Energy Plan: A "Brighter Future" for American Workers?" describes the impacts of climate change on U.S. workers and points out that "the regulations President Trump proposes to eliminate are actually protections for Americans' health, safety, and jobs. The first energy regulation he eliminated was one requiring American energy companies to report investments that they made abroad - an action that will only make it easier for corporations to move American jobs overseas without our even knowing about it."
Marching for Climate, Jobs and Justice
The Labor Network for Sustainability serves on the Steering Committee for the People's Climate Movement, which is planning a March for Climate, Jobs and Justice in Washington DC on April 29 along with a week of actions.


"We plan to be there on April 29, said Michael Leon Guerrero, LNS Executive Director, "Trump is setting us back decades in terms of workers rights, environmental justice and climate change. We encourage all workers that want a future for our children that is healthy and sustainable to join us."

Labor Network for Sustainability is dedicated to engaging trade unions, workers and our allies to support economic, social, and environmental sustainability. LNS provides a community for those in the labor and sustainability movements and their allies who care about economic justice, ecology, and equality. Our members are helping labor become a force for advancing worker interests - while advancing the broader social good.