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Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
In an era of escalating climate threats, we need a stronger public sector with more resources to mitigate risks, help people weather storms, and adapt for the future.
Since Friday, more than 80 people, including dozens of young summer camp attendees, have died in Central Texas from flooding intensified by the fossil fuel-driven climate crisis. With search-and-rescue operations ongoing and active flash flood warnings in the region, the death toll is expected to continue climbing.
Over the weekend, Texas officials quickly tried to blame the carnage on inadequate warnings from the National Weather Service (NWS), which has been gutted by the Trump administration. President Donald Trump himself lied about this, too. When asked if he thinks the federal government should rehire recently fired meteorologists, he erroneously claimed that “nobody expected” this flooding and that NWS staff “didn’t see it.”
However, NWS provided accurate forecasts and warnings despite everything that Trump and Elon Musk’s DOGE wrecking crew have been doing to impair the agency.
We sorely need a return to the Rooseveltian ideal of big government that works for working people, including by phasing out the fossil fuel industry and protecting us from increasingly frequent and severe storms, heatwaves, and wildfires.
That’s not to suggest that the Trump administration’s ill-advised cuts to the federal forecasting apparatus couldn’t have contributed to lethal havoc on the ground. Local NWS offices were missing key officials, which may have undermined swift and cohesive coordination between forecasters and local emergency managers.
Tom Fahy, the legislative director for the National Weather Service Employees Organization (the union representing NWS workers), told The New York Times that the agency’s San Angelo office, which covers many of the hardest-hit areas, was missing a senior hydrologist, staff forecaster, and a meteorologist-in-charge.
The nearby NWS office in San Antonio “also had significant vacancies, including a warning coordination meteorologist and science officer,” the Times reported. “Staff members in those positions are meant to work with local emergency managers to plan for floods, including when and how to warn local residents and help them evacuate.” The warning coordination meteorologist reportedly left on April 30, accepting the Trump administration’s early retirement offer. This runs counter to Trump’s weekend claim that his policies didn’t lead to vacancies.
In early May, CNN reported that 30 of NWS’ 122 weather forecast offices around the country were missing a meteorologist-in-charge. Former and current agency personnel made clear that the absence of chief meteorologists and other leaders could jeopardize timely communications between forecasters, the media, and local emergency managers.
Making matters worse, Texas lawmakers earlier this year refused to pass a bill that would have improved local disaster warning systems. Rob Kelly, the top elected official in Kerr County, the flood-prone jurisdiction where most of the deaths have occurred, said that officials considered installing a warning system years ago but declined due to the purportedly high cost.
In the aftermath of increasingly common climate disasters, it becomes clear why, when someone asserts that investments in risk reduction are “expensive,” the response should be, “compared with what?”
According to The Guardian, “Questions are also being asked” about whether Kerr County officials “had approved development along the river bank that may have skirted rules issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) that control where homes may be built in areas vulnerable to flooding.”
It should be noted here that advocates of the so-called abundance agenda, which we have warned is an attempt to launder unpopular neoliberal policies, have repeatedly held up Texas as a model to be emulated, implying that circumventing environmental regulations to build more housing is sound policy.
Amid the flooding on July 4, Trump signed into law the GOP’s budget reconciliation bill, which will curtail clean energy and expand the fossil fuel combustion that supercharges extreme weather. A few days earlier, the Trump administration submitted a budget request to Congress that would eliminate all climate research at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the parent agency of NWS.
On July 5, Trump approved Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) request for a major disaster declaration. While it remains to be seen, the federal response could be hobbled due to Trump and Musk’s ongoing war on FEMA.
In short, the Trump administration is simultaneously exacerbating climate change and eroding society’s ability to understand, prepare for, and respond to it. This is precisely the opposite of what should be happening right now.
The deadly Texas floods will not be the last manifestation of extreme weather turbocharged by fossil fuel pollution. In an era of escalating climate threats, we need a stronger public sector with more resources to mitigate risks, help people weather storms, and adapt for the future.
For too long, neoliberal Democrats have joined Republicans in bashing the government and calling for deregulation, austerity, and privatization. In February, Matthew Yglesias went so far as to encourage Democrats to “channel their inner DOGE,” portraying party elites’ abandonment of FDR’s New Deal politics—from Jimmy Carter to Bill Clinton to Barack Obama—as a step in the right direction.
In fact, we sorely need a return to the Rooseveltian ideal of big government that works for working people, including by phasing out the fossil fuel industry and protecting us from increasingly frequent and severe storms, heatwaves, and wildfires.
In the meantime, congressional Democrats must not neglect their oversight duties. They ought to launch investigations and ruthlessly question the Trump administration’s culpability in the Texas flooding disaster.
The employees were put on leave after they signed a letter saying the Trump EPA's actions "endanger public health and erode scientific progress."
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has put 144 employees on leave after they signed a letter criticizing the Trump administration's "harmful" policies.
EPA press secretary Brigit Hirsch accused the employees of "undermining, sabotaging, and undercutting the administration's agenda." But the union that represents these employees is calling it an act of illegal "retaliation."
The "declaration of dissent", published by Stand Up for Science Monday, had been signed by 620 people as of Thursday. Addressed to EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, the letter accused the administration of "recklessly undermining" the agency's mission under his watch. It accused the administration of "ignoring scientific consensus to benefit polluters."
"This administration's actions directly contradict EPA's own scientific assessments on human health risks, most notably regarding asbestos, mercury, and greenhouse gases," the letter said.
Since Trump retook office, the administration has eviscerated policies meant to contain pollution, slashing funding for green energy production and electric vehicles while championing increased fossil fuel drilling and consumption. It has also rolled back the enforcement of limits on cancer-causing "forever chemicals" in water.
The signatories also pointed to the Trump EPA's "undermining of public trust" by using official channels to trumpet "misinformation and overtly partisan rhetoric."
They called out EPA press releases, which have referred to climate science as a "religion," EPA grants as "green slush funds," and "clean coal" as "beautiful." The letter also suggested the EPA had violated the Hatch Act by promoting political initiatives like Trump's tariffs and the Republican budget reconciliation bill.
"Make no mistake: your actions endanger public health and erode scientific progress—not only in America—but around the world," the letter said.
The employees also accused the administration of "promoting a culture of fear." They cited comments by top Trump officials, such as Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought, who has said he wanted to put EPA employees "in trauma" and make them unable "to go to work because they are increasingly viewed as the villains."
While some signatories signed their names, many others chose to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. That retaliation came Thursday, when—according to The New York Times—144 employees received an email putting them on leave for the next two weeks "pending an administrative investigation."
The decision was widely criticized as a violation of the employees' First Amendment rights.
Tim Whitehouse, the executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which has previously represented EPA and other employees, said federal employees are allowed to publicly criticize the administration they work for.
"The letter of dissent did really nothing to undermine or sabotage the agenda of the administration," Whitehouse told The Washington Post. "We believe strongly that the EPA should protect the First Amendment rights of their employees."
Bill Wolfe, a former environmental policy professional with Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, said that the letter "was a classic form of whistleblowing that is protected by federal whistleblower laws and the 1st Amendment, as upheld by federal courts."
Justin Chen, the union representative for EPA employees under the American Federation of Government Employees, told the Times that the agency's actions were "clearly an act of retaliation" and said the union would "protect our members to the full extent of the law."
Despite the punishment, one of the signatories anonymously told The Post that they had no regrets.
"I took the risk knowing what was up," the employee wrote. "I'll say it before, and now it rings even more true … if this is the EPA they want me to work for, then I don't want to work for the EPA."
"President Trump has made his priorities clear as day: He wants to outright defund programs that help working Americans while he shovels massive tax breaks at billionaires like himself."
The budget blueprint that U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled Friday would give a record $1.01 trillion to the American military for the coming fiscal year while imposing $163 billion in total cuts to housing, education, healthcare, climate, and labor programs.
The proposal, released by Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russell Vought, was viewed by Democratic lawmakers and other critics as a clear statement of the White House's intent to gut programs that working class Americans rely on while pursuing another round of tax breaks for the ultra-wealthy and bolstering the Pentagon, a morass of waste and abuse.
"President Trump has made his priorities clear as day," said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), vice chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee. "He wants to outright defund programs that help working Americans while he shovels massive tax breaks at billionaires like himself and raises taxes on middle-class Americans with his reckless tariffs."
"This president believes we should shred at least $163 billion in investments here at home that make all the difference for families and have been essential to America's success—but that we should hand billionaires and the biggest corporations trillions in new tax breaks," Murray added. "That is outrageous—and it should offend every hardworking American who wants their tax dollars to help them live a good life, not pad the pockets of billionaires."
"Trump is prioritizing his own wallet and the tax benefits of his wealthy donors—leaving local communities and small towns to bear the brunt of his cuts."
According to the OMB summary, Trump's Fiscal Year 2026 budget would cut over $4.5 billion from Title I and K-12 education programs, $4 billion from a program that provides heating assistance to low-income households, $2.4 billion from safe drinking water funding, $26 billion from rental assistance programs, $17 billion from the National Institutes of Health, $100 million from environmental justice programs, $1.3 billion from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and $4.6 billion from the Labor Department.
"President Trump is again betraying the millions of Americans who believed him when he promised to lower costs," Tony Carrk, executive director of Accountable.US, said in a statement. "This time, he's taking aim at anyone who attends a public school, relies on rental assistance to keep a roof over their heads, or accesses healthcare through Medicaid or Medicare."
"Instead of standing up for everyday Americans," said Carrk, "Trump is prioritizing his own wallet and the tax benefits of his wealthy donors—leaving local communities and small towns to bear the brunt of his cuts."
Bobby Kogan, senior director of federal budget policy at the Center for American Progress, noted that the cuts to social programs in the White House's budget proposal "are extreme by any standard, but they're extreme even by Trump's own standards," far exceeding even what he proposed during his first term.
"The cuts in this budget are especially egregious," said Kogan, "when you consider that Trump is also trying to push the largest Medicaid and food assistance cuts in American history through Congress over the next few months."
Meanwhile, the U.S. military would see a $113 billion budget increase compared to current levels if the Republican-controlled Congress were to enact Trump's proposal. The 13% increase would push the nation's annual military budget above $1 trillion, which analysts have described as the highest level since the Second World War.
"The Pentagon is bloated, wasteful, and has NEVER passed an audit," the progressive watchdog group Public Citizen wrote in response to Trump's budget. "What a disgrace."