December, 10 2018, 11:00pm EDT
WASHINGTON
The Trump administration took action today to weaken key parts of the Clean Water Act. The Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers agencies jointly proposed exempting polluters from important programs that prevent and clean up water pollution, by removing protections from certain streams,wetlands, and other water bodies.
This Dirty Water Rule would wipe out safeguards for water bodies that provide drinking water to tens of millions of people, including vulnerable populations such as children, and for wetlands that filter pollution and protect our communities from flooding.
For more than 45 years, the Clean Water Act has helped work toward a time when all water bodies are safe for swimming and fishing, and when drinking water supplies are protected from pollution. Now the Trump administration is moving backwards.
Clean water is essential for healthy fish and wildlife habitat and for quality outdoor recreation opportunities. The outdoor recreation economy supports 7.6 million jobs and $887 billion in consumer spending, and it depends on clean water.
Polluted water harms local economies and businesses. Breweries, outdoor recreation, tourism and local businesses rely on clean water to create jobs and power local economies. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) estimates, for example, that algae outbreaks and "dead zones," such as the one that forms annually in the Gulf of Mexico, cost fishermen nearly $82 million annually in lost seafood catches. These problems are fueled by pollution into streams and rivers.
Members of the Clean Water for All Coalition offered these responses:
"Nurses understand the negative health effects of exposure to dirty water--whether it's from neurotoxic chemicals, like lead in drinking water, or chemicals linked to cancers and hormone disruption found in coal ash ponds, or fracking waste water that pollutes groundwater sources," said Katie Huffling, executive director of the Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments and a nurse. "This attack on the Clean Water Rule is an urgent public health threat, and we strongly oppose any efforts to repeal this vital,health-protective rule."
"This is an early Christmas gift to polluters and a lump of coal for everyone else," said Bob Irvin, President and CEO of American Rivers. "Too many people in our country, urban and rural, are living with unsafe drinking water. Low-income communities,indigenous peoples and communities of color are hit hardest by pollution and river degradation. Instead of rolling back the rules and creating new loopholes for polluters, we need to strengthen safeguards for the rivers, streams, and wetlands that supply our drinking water."
"Clean water is as essential to a healthy economy as it is to a healthy environment. Business depends on clean water. We don't get clean water by gutting protections for streams and wetlands. We can't support and grow businesses by putting the natural water infrastructure they rely on at risk of destruction. The Trump Administration's proposal to replace the Clean Water Rule puts polluters ahead of the rest of the business community, said "Hammad Atassi, CEO of the American Sustainable Business Council, which has a member network representing more than 250,000 businesses across the country.
"Every American wants to be sure that their family is safe, and that means clean, safe drinking water." said Kim Glas, executive director of the BlueGreen Alliance. However, the Trump administration today proposed to significantly weaken the Clean Water Rule, which safeguards the drinking water supplies for 117 million Americans. Enough is enough. The EPA should scrap their changes to this rule and instead enforce the existing rule that protects the water quality for millions of Americans."
"Everyone deserves the right to safe and healthy water, especially those communities most vulnerable to harmful exposures such as children," said Nsedu Obot Witherspoon, Executive Director of the Children's Environmental Health Network. "Our children of today and tomorrow simply deserve better and need better actions for their protections."
"The Dirty Water Rule continues the Trump administration's unbroken streak of doing whatever it can to put corporate special interests and their priorities first," said Bob Wendelgass, president and CEO of Clean Water Action. "This proposal will put our health and drinking water in jeopardy by radically reinterpreting the Clean Water Act while ignoring science. No one benefits from this scheme except for developers, the fossil fuel industry, and other companies who will have a free hand to pave over or plow under streams and wetlands."
"Today's action is nothing short of a full attack on clean water for millions of Americans. It's another shameless scheme to line the pockets of the multi-billion dollar polluters who helped put President Trump in office," said Abigail Dillen, President of Earthjustice.
"This Dirty Water Rule turns the mission of the EPA on its head: EPA is proposing to strip federal protection from drinking water sources for millions of Americans," said John Rumpler, director of the clean water program for Environment America. "It defies common sense, sound science, and the will of the American people."
"This outrageous move comes at a time when our communities are already facing crumbling infrastructure,increasing impacts from climate change, and corporate polluters that face extremely limited accountability for poisoning our people and planet,"said Rev Lennox Yearwood Jr., President& CEO of Hip Hop Caucus. "The consequences of this move are that millions of people will have less access to clean drinking water and those responsible will continue to get away with it. Unfortunately, low-income and communities of color will continue to bear the largest burden."
"This despicable attack on our clean water from Trump and his corrupt administration comes as no surprise as they have clearly and consistently put the profits of polluters ahead of what's best for our families," said Gene Karpinski, President of the League of Conservation Voters. "However, with too many communities across the country struggling with health crises related to their water, whether it be lead poisoning in Flint or toxic red tide in Florida or coal ash and hog waste-contaminated rivers in North Carolina, Trump's Dirty Water Rule is still an appalling rollback of critical safeguards for our waterways. It is crystal clear that we must do more, not less, to ensure every family in this country has access to clean and safe drinking water, and we pledge to fight this dangerous proposal to turn our drinking water sources back into the waste dumps of big polluters."
"Healthy streams and wetlands are essential for people and wildlife," said Collin O' Mara, president and CEO of the National Wildlife Federation. "Today's action allows a few to cut corners while increasing the risks to wildlife and to the drinking water for millions of Americans."
"People should be able to drink water and take showers in their homes without fear of being poisoned,"said Michael McAfee,president and CEO of Policylink. "Yet, nearly 77 million Americans live in communities that lack access to clean, safe water or sustainable water infrastructure. Low-income people and communities of color are already disproportionately impacted by contaminated water, which can cause a variety of health problems, particularly for children, and this proposal will exacerbate this inequity. Water is life. Caring for it is our shared responsibility. We must urge Americans to take a stand against this proposed Dirty Water Rule to ensure a future where everyone has access to clean water."
"This latest attack on our water is a new low for Trump and Wheeler as they again unabashedly side with corporate polluters instead of our families,"said Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club. "Not only will this rollback endanger the drinking water sources for millions of people, but it also jeopardizes wildlife habitat, outdoor recreation, and economies that rely on safe, clean water. The Trump administration must stop rigging the system for special interests and start listening to the American public by acting to protect our water."
"Big polluters could not have crafted a bigger free pass to dump if they wrote it themselves," said Blan Holman, managing attorney for the Southern Environmental Law Center's Charleston office. "This administration's efforts to dismantle the Clean Water Act are a full-frontal assault on one of our country's most important and longstanding environmental safeguards that has prevented unchecked and unlimited pollution from contaminating our waterways and drinking water sources for nearly 50 years. Protecting the South's waters against pollution is our top priority. In the face of this serious threat, SELC and our partners will fight this dangerous proposal in court."
The Sierra Club is the most enduring and influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. We amplify the power of our 3.8 million members and supporters to defend everyone's right to a healthy world.
(415) 977-5500LATEST NEWS
US Dodges Growing Calls for Probe of Mass Graves at Gaza Hospitals
"Somehow I don't think the U.S. State Department would defer to Russia as a credible source to investigate itself if a mass grave were discovered in Ukrainian territory it had occupied," said one legal expert.
Apr 24, 2024
While continuing to give Israel billions of dollars in support to wage war on the Gaza Strip, the Biden administration this week has declined to join the growing global demands for an international probe into mass graves discovered at hospitals in the besieged Palestinian enclave.
Two journalists on Tuesday questioned Vedant Patel, a spokesperson for the U.S. State Department, about the administration's response to the hundreds of bodies found at Gaza City's al-Shifa Hospital and Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis as well as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk's call for an independent investigation.
"Would you support such an independent investigation?" Said Arikat asked during a press briefing. Patel responded, "Right now, Said, we are asking for more information... That is squarely where we are leaving the conversation."
Patel added that "I don't have any details to match, confirm, or offer as it relates to that. We're aware of those reports, and we have asked the government of Israel for additional clarity and information. And that's where I'm at."
When Said asked a follow-up about potential U.S. support for a probe, Patel reiterated that the administration is awaiting information from the Israeli government.
Later, Niall Stanage asked Patel to explain U.S. "resistance" to supporting a probe, the spokesperson insisted that "it's not about resistance to this particular situation, it is me not wanting to speak in detail about something which Said posed as a hypothetical question when, from the United States' perspective, I don't have any additional information on this aside from the public reporting."
After Patel again stressed that the administration has asked Israel for more information, Stanage inquired, "And do you believe the government of Israel is a credible source in enlightening you?"
The spokesperson interrupted Stanage to say, "We do."
While supporting the six-month Israeli assault on Gaza that the International Court of Justice has found to be plausibly genocidal, the Biden administration is also arming Ukrainians' resistance to a Russian invasion. Brian Finucane, a senior adviser for the Crisis Group's U.S. program and a former legal adviser at the State Department, pointed to the latter.
"Somehow I don't think the U.S. State Department would defer to Russia as a credible source to investigate itself if a mass grave were discovered in Ukrainian territory it had occupied," Finucane said on social media in response to Stanage's questioning.
Meanwhile, European Union spokesperson Peter Stano made clear Tuesday that the E.U. supports an independent probe.
"This is something that forces us to call for an independent investigation of all the suspicions and all the circumstances, because indeed it creates the impression that there might have been violations of international human rights committed," Stano said. "That's why it's important to have independent investigation and to ensure accountability."
Human rights groups around the world joined the call for an independent investigation on Wednesday, as the official death toll in Gaza hit 34,262 with 77,229 people injured and thousands more missing and presumed dead beneath the rubble.
In an Arabic statement translated by Al Jazeera, the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor said that the number of bodies found in the mass graves is "alarming, and requires urgent international action, including the formation of an independent international investigation committee."
The group added that some of those killed were subjected to "premeditated murder as well as arbitrary and extrajudicial executions while they were detained and handcuffed."
Amnesty International senior director of research, advocacy, policy, and campaigns Erika Guevara Rosas said in a statement that "the harrowing discovery of these mass graves underscores the urgency of ensuring immediate access for human rights investigators, including forensic experts, to the occupied Gaza Strip to ensure that evidence is preserved and to carry out independent and transparent investigations with the aim of guaranteeing accountability for any violations of international law."
"Lack of access for human rights investigators to Gaza has hampered effective investigations into the full scale of the human rights violations and crimes under international law committed over the past six months, allowing for the documentation of just a tiny fraction of these abuses," she noted. "Without proper investigations to determine how these deaths took place or what violations may have been committed, we may never find out the truth of the horrors behind these mass graves."
Guevara Rosas continued:
Mass grave sites are potential crime scenes offering vital and time-sensitive forensic evidence; they must be protected until professional forensic experts with the necessary skills and resources can safely carry out adequate exhumations and accurate identification of remains.
The absence of forensic experts and the decimation of Gaza's medical sector as a result of the war and Israel's cruel blockade, along with the lack of availability of the necessary resources for the identification of bodies such as DNA testing, are huge obstacles to the identifications of remains. This denies those killed the opportunity to have a dignified burial and deprives families with relatives missing or forcibly disappeared the right to know and to justice—leaving them in a limbo of uncertainty and anguish.
Noting that the International Court of Justice directed Israel to preserve evidence in its initial genocide case order, Guevara Rosas said that "amid a total vacuum of accountability and mounting evidence of war crimes in Gaza, Israeli authorities must ensure they comply with the ICJ ruling by granting immediate access to independent human rights investigators and ensuring that all evidence of violations is preserved."
"Third states must pressure Israel to comply with the ICJ orders by allowing the immediate entry into the Gaza Strip of independent human rights investigators and forensic experts, including the U.N.-appointed Commission of Inquiry and investigators of the International Criminal Court," she added. "There can be no truth and justice without proper, transparent independent investigations into these deaths."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Sanders Launches Probe of 'Outrageously Overpriced' Ozempic and Wegovy
The Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee chair said that the popular medications "will not do any good for the millions of patients who cannot afford them."
Apr 24, 2024
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday opened an investigation into an "outrageously overpriced" medication manufactured by a Denmark-based company whose value by market capitalization is larger than the Scandinavian country's gross domestic product.
Sanders (I-Vt.), who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, sent a letter to Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, CEO of Novo Nordisk. The company makes semaglutide, a glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) agonist used to treat Type 2 diabetes under the brand name Ozempic and, when sold as Wegovy, to treat obesity in adults with at least one weight-related comorbidity.
"The scientists at Novo Nordisk deserve great credit for developing these drugs that have the potential to be a game-changer for millions of Americans struggling with Type 2 diabetes and obesity," Sanders acknowledged. "As important as these drugs are, they will not do any good for the millions of patients who cannot afford them."
"Further, if the prices for these products are not substantially reduced they also have the potential to bankrupt Medicare, Medicaid, and our entire healthcare system," he added.
Sanders continued:
Today, Novo Nordisk is charging patients in the United States up to 15 times more for Ozempic and Wegovy than it charges patients in Canada, Europe, or Japan. For example, your company charges $969 in the United States for one month of Ozempic but just $155 in Canada and just $59 in Germany. Further, Novo Nordisk charges Americans $1,349 for one month Wegovy but just $140 in Germany and just $92 in the United Kingdom.
"Meanwhile," the senator noted, "researchers at Yale University estimate that both of these drugs can be profitably manufactured for less than $5 a month."
"The result of these astronomically high prices is that Ozempic and Wegovy are out of reach for millions of Americans who need them," Sanders said. "Unfortunately, Novo Nordisk's pricing has turned drugs that could improve people's lives into luxury goods, all while Novo Nordisk made over $12 billion in profits last year—up 76% from 2021. That is unacceptable."
As of March 2024, Novo Nordisk was Europe's most highly valued company by market capitalization. Its $554 billion market cap is significantly higher than Denmark's annual gross domestic product of approximately $410 billion, according to International Monetary Fund figures.
Sanders also pointed out that Novo Nordisk is charging different prices for Ozempic and Wegovy, even though they're "the exact same drug."
"Novo Nordisk charges Americans with obesity nearly $400 more every month than those with Type 2 diabetes for the same product provided in similar doses," he wrote.
"The unjustifiably high prices of Ozempic and Wegovy are already straining the budgets of Medicare and Medicaid and severely limiting access for patients who need these drugs," the letter says. "Last year, researchers at Vanderbilt University's Department of Health Policy and the University of Chicago's Department of Medicine estimated in the New England Journal of Medicine that it would cost Medicare over $150 billion a year to cover Wegovy and other similar weight loss drugs."
"To put this in perspective, the cost of all retail prescription drugs covered by Medicare in 2022 was less than $130 billion," Sanders added.
"As chairman of the committee, I am asking Novo Nordisk to substantially reduce the price of Ozempic and Wegovy so that these important drugs can be available to Americans with Type 2 diabetes and obesity," he wrote.
Existing law empowers the government to step in to lower drug prices in service of the public interest. Under the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980—legislation meant to promote the commercialization and public availability of government-funded inventions—federal agencies reserve the right to "march in" and authorize price-lowering generic alternatives to patented medications developed with public funding.
However, U.S. administrations—including President Joe Biden's—have been loath to exercise "march-in" rights.
Under pressure from the public and lawmakers led by Sanders, Novo Nordisk last year announced that it would cut prices by up to 75% for some of its insulin products.
Responding to Wednesday's letter, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America—Big Pharma's leading lobbyist—accused Sanders of "attacking an innovative company to advance a political agenda instead of addressing the real cause of affordability challenges."
Noting Novo Nordisk's bigger-than-Denmark market cap, Warren Gunnels, the HELP Committee's majority staff director, wrote on social media that the company "made over $12 billion in profits last year by, among other things, charging Americans $969 for Ozempic while it can be purchased for $59 in Germany and costs $5 to make."
"Our political agenda is to end this greed," he added. "Guilty. As. Charged."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Texas State Troopers in Riot Gear Crack Down on UT Students' Gaza Protest
"Why do we even have these institutions of higher learning if we won't let students speak their conscience and protest?" said one University of Texas professor.
Apr 24, 2024
This is a developing story... Please check back for possible updates...
Civil rights advocates on Wednesday expressed alarm at a rapid escalation by Texas state troopers who descended on a student-led protest at University of Texas at Austin, which was organized in solidarity with Gaza and other U.S. college students taking part in a growing anti-war movement.
UT students gathered on campus at midday and were promptly given two minutes to disperse by state troopers, who had already been called to the scene.
The troopers were equipped with riot gear, with some carrying assault rifles and several stationed on horses.
Erick Lara, a 20-year-old sophomore, told The Dallas Morning News that the nonviolent protest transformed "within minutes" after the police began arresting demonstrators.
"I didn't think it would escalate this far," he told the outlet. "And I didn't think there would be this much police intervention from what's supposed to be a peaceful protest. Not very peaceful when there's a bunch of aggressors around, especially on horses."
The organizers called the gathering "The Popular University" and said it was aimed at pressuring UT to "divest from death."
The protesters walked out of their classes to demand UT divest from weapons manufacturers in order to end its complicity in Israel's U.S.-backed assault on Gaza, which has killed at least 34,262 Palestinians.
Student-run newspaper The Daily Texanreported roughly 50 state troopers were deployed to stop the initial protest of about 150-200 people.
Ryan Chandler, a reporter for NBC affiliate KXAN-TV and UT alum, reported that there were at least 10 students detained.
"Went here for four years, never saw anything like this," said Chandler, posting a video of a group of police pushing one student to the ground and arresting them.
Joseph Pierce, a Stony Brook University professor who attended graduate school at UT, also said the escalation was an unusually "drastic response to students advocating for an end to the genocide of the Palestinian people."
"It is a response that did not occur when in 2005 we protested the anti-gay marriage bill; in the late 2000s when we protested anti-immigration bills; in the 2010s when we protested the open-carry bill," Pierce said. "It is a clear attempt at silencing Palestinian and anti-Zionist Jewish voices."
The students faced the state troopers in a standoff on the university's main street.
"This violence against peaceful student protesters at UT Austin is absolutely horrifying—and should be condemned in the strongest terms by every politician and mainstream journalist," said former New Yorker editor Erin Overbey.
UT media and Middle East studies professor Nahid Siamdoust said the university "brought out everything but the kitchen sink to make sure" students couldn't erect an anti-war encampment like students at Columbia University, New York University, and other schools across the U.S. have in recent days.
The university had informed organizers with the on-campus Palestine Solidarity Committee on Tuesday that exercising their First Amendment rights in support of Palestinians in Gaza would "violate our policies and rules."
"The freedom to protest is integral to our democracy," said the ACLU of Texas Wednesday amid reports of the crackdown. "UT Austin students have a First Amendment right to freely express their political opinions—without threats of arrest and violence."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular