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At risk in the imminent spending battle are billions of dollars essential to keeping our water safe and clean, funding everything from replacing toxic lead pipes to upgrading treatment technology to remove PFAS.
When US Congress went on summer break for all of August, they left on the table a major piece of legislation that will have profound consequences for the safety of our water: the annual spending, or appropriations, bill.
This legislation funds federal programs, departments, and agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the fiscal year, which runs through September 30.
When they return in September, Congress will have less than a month to hammer out a deal to keep the lights on—or many parts of the federal government will shut down on the first of October.
At risk in this imminent spending battle are billions of dollars essential to keeping our water safe and clean, funding everything from replacing toxic lead pipes to upgrading treatment technology to remove per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). Congress members have already made proposals for the spending bill attacking those funds, putting clean water for many in jeopardy.
At the same time, US President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans are turning to a new sneaky backdoor partisan tactic called rescission to slash funding and go back on their own deals. This is not only a threat to clean water support, but to the funding of any government program. Congress must block any spending bill that leaves the door open for rescissions.
Under the regular procedure, the House approves a spending bill and sends it to the Senate, where it needs 60 votes to end the filibuster. This generally ensures a more bipartisan process in the Senate. When Congress hasn’t been able to pass regular spending bills, it has passed continuing resolutions to extend current levels of funding. These still require a 60-vote majority in the Senate.
But the Trump administration and congressional Republicans are turning to a special tool to upend this bipartisan system. That tool—rescissions—allows them to slash spending they already agreed to, without any say from Democrats.
At a time when the price of basic necessities continues to grow, we cannot eliminate federal support for safe, affordable water.
With rescissions, Trump can send a list of programs that he wants to cut in a special request to Congress. Crucially, the vote to eliminate those funds requires only a simple majority in the Senate. It is not subject to the filibuster.
These backdoor recissions are the same partisan scheme that Trump and congressional Republicans used to eliminate support for PBS and NPR. Now, some Republicans have signalled that if Congress passes a continuing resolution, they’ll work with Trump to roll back funding in that bill through rescissions.
This threatens funding for everything from safe food to education to housing. Funding for safe drinking water is also at risk—the EPA, the leading federal agency for protecting our water, has already been a major target of the Trump administration. Rescissions’ threat to safe water looms large.
In proposals for this year’s spending bill, Trump and congressional Republicans have directly attacked the EPA’s vital work to protect our water. By gutting its funding and attacking its workforce, they’re undermining the main federal agency responsible for safe drinking water. Among its crucial responsibilities, the EPA sets limits on contaminants in water, develops methods to test for and remove toxic substances, and establishes regulations that prevent water pollution in the first place.
Trump and Congress have also proposed slashing hundreds of millions of EPA dollars dedicated to local and state water safety projects. (About half of the EPA’s entire budget goes directly to states through State and Tribal Assistance Grants.)
That includes massive cuts to the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Funds (SRFs). The SRFs are the primary source of federal funding for drinking water and wastewater infrastructure in the country.
For decades, these funds have provided billions of dollars to build and improve wastewater treatment systems and help communities comply with water safety regulations. Without them, we would have more contaminated, less affordable water.
These proposals strike a dangerous tone for Republican leadership. The State Revolving Funds (SRFs) have traditionally enjoyed broad bipartisan support because they fund basic water safety projects that provide immense public health benefits to communities.
These projects are managed by states, which pass SRF funds to local water and sewer utilities. New York State alone has $9.5 billion-worth of drinking water projects and $6 billion of wastewater and stormwater projects seeking support from its SRFs.
Projects like these are not only happening in New York—they’re planned and underway in every single state. And they are all under fire from Trump and Congress.
The proposed massive cuts come at a time when the needs of our nation’s water and wastewater systems are growing. The EPA estimates that upgrading our water and wastewater infrastructure will cost $1.3 trillion over the next two decades—just to comply with existing federal law.
Federal funding for water infrastructure, however, has plummeted 77% in real terms since its peak in the late 1970s. Meanwhile, the cost paid by localities has more than tripled after accounting for inflation. Local water utilities pay for these costs by hiking water bills for local businesses and households.
Senate Democrats have an opportunity to defend safe water and stop Republicans’ rescission scheme right now.
SRF cuts would lead to higher water rates for many people who already struggle to pay their bills. Already, as many as 1 in 3 households struggles to afford their water bill.
When households receive unaffordable water bills, they may cut back on medicine, groceries, or other essentials; or they don’t pay for their water service. More people will fall into water debt, lose service to shutoffs, and even lose their homes because of unpaid water bills. At a time when the price of basic necessities continues to grow, we cannot eliminate federal support for safe, affordable water.
Instead of cutting water infrastructure funding, we need to expand it. Beyond this year’s spending battle, Congress must pass the WATER Act (HR 3376, S 1730) to safeguard federal water funding from more reckless spending cuts.
Senate Democrats have an opportunity to defend safe water and stop Republicans’ rescission scheme right now. This year’s spending bill needs support from seven Senate Democrats to pass. They must leverage this power to pass a bill that (1) fully funds safe water and (2) guarantees that funding by preventing future unilateral rescissions by Trump and congressional Republicans.
Our communities need lasting federal support to help ensure safe, affordable water and sewer service for all. Safe water is nonnegotiable. Our elected leaders must stand up for us and oppose any spending bill that slashes federal support for clean water, and any spending bill that leaves the door open for Trump’s partisan rescissions.
The nation’s largest dollar stores continually fail to meaningfully strengthen their chemical policies and intervene in their supply chains to keep their shoppers safe.
When shopping for the holidays, most people reasonably assume that products sold in major American retail stores are free of toxic chemicals. After all, harmful substances like lead and mercury have no place in the shopping cart, and regulations must prevent this kind of dangerous exposure, right?
Unfortunately, this is not the case. A recent study revealed that over half of the items tested on dollar stores’ shelves contained toxic chemicals. This includes lead found in tablecloths, jewelry, and baby toys with known links to brain development harm; phthalates in school supplies, silly straws, and bath toys with links to early puberty in girls, birth defects in the male reproductive system, obesity, and diabetes; BPA in receipts, cookware, and can linings that can affect the brain and prostate gland of fetuses, infants, and children; and PFAS—long-lasting synthetic chemicals—found in popcorn bags that can affect the immune system and liver function.
Just last month Toxic Free Future released their latest Retailer Report Card, which graded Dollar General with a D+ and Dollar Tree/Family Dollar with a D for safety, based on hazardous chemicals in their products, company commitment to transparency, a willingness to change, and how easily customers can tell what substances are on store items.
With the incoming presidential administration promising to slash health and safety rules, customers and communities will have even fewer protections.
But for many families, shopping elsewhere isn’t an option. Dollar stores are often the only retailers selling essential household goods, including food, in many rural towns and urban neighborhoods, leaving customers with nowhere else to go. Dollar stores are frequently located in communities that already face multiple health and environmental risk factors, such as industrial pollution from factories or deteriorated drinking water. This means a family’s exposure to chemicals via items purchased at dollar stores is part of accumulated exposures.
Dollar stores’ leadership has been aware for over a decade that their products contain lead, BPA, phthalates, and PFAS, jeopardizing customer health. During this time, environmental justice and public health groups nationwide have advocated for safer products. Investors in these companies have raised concerns directly with management and through shareholder resolutions. Yet, the problem persists. Even this year Dollar Tree knowingly kept lead-contaminated apple sauce on its shelves, putting children in harm’s way. The stores have taken only minimal actions to address a handful of chemicals in some product categories.
To say federal agencies tasked with regulating these products fall short would be an understatement. Many take a “graveyard approach,” acting only after someone has suffered a physical toll. The federal Toxic Substances Control Act is so weak that only a handful of chemicals have ever been restricted, while tens of thousands have been exempted or fast-tracked for approval. With the incoming presidential administration promising to slash health and safety rules, customers and communities will have even fewer protections.
With this lack of protective action on the part of state and federal regulators, we urge dollar stores to do the right thing. In 2023, Dollar General's net sales were over $38 billion, and Dollar Tree’s revenues were over $30 billion. They can afford to stop buying products from suppliers that use toxic chemicals and switch to readily available safer alternatives. Mike Creedon, interim chief executive officer for Dollar Tree, claims, “Safety First, Safety Always is the guiding mantra for our store.” But these are only words when there is no action.
Instead, the nation’s largest dollar stores continually fail to meaningfully strengthen their chemical policies and intervene in their supply chains to keep their shoppers safe. Dollar General failed to expand its list of 19 restricted substances. The list does not include PFAS, most phthalates, and many other chemicals known to cause harm. It also applies only to private-label products. Similarly, Dollar Tree has not publicly documented progress on reducing chemicals or plastics of high concern in the last four years and has made no indication of support for the development or sale of safer products.
Competitors, including Walmart, have already made this change. In 2022, the company disclosed that it removed 37 million pounds of phthalates from products in response to consumer demand, with publicly available corporate policies. Similarly, Apple recently received praise for removing harmful chemicals and plastics from its products and even committed to a Full Material Disclosure program which promises manufacturers full transparency on products’ material compositions. These transitions are increasingly mainstream, and dollar stores are falling further and further behind.
Every family has the right to feel safe while shopping, and with the holidays around the corner, this issue is even more important. Dollar stores should transparently report on their progress and work with their suppliers to prevent all known dangerous chemicals from being used to make products sold in stores. Until this happens, dollar stores are putting already vulnerable communities at risk. Safe alternatives exist, and the transition to non-toxic products is both feasible and cost-effective in the long run. Dollar stores must stop prioritizing profit over families. We refuse to be sacrificed for the bottom line.
Banning lead from our national parks would be one of the single biggest conservation advances in a generation.
Earlier this month, a California condor, the first of its kind to hatch and take flight in Zion National Park, died of lead poisoning just shy of its fifth birthday. Shockingly, one of this condor’s siblings was earlier found to have the highest recorded lead value ever documented in a live bird over the entire 28-year history of the condor release program.
Lead poisoning remains the leading cause of diagnosed death among California condors. About 90% of condors trapped and tested during this past year had blood lead levels indicating lead exposure. As scavengers, condors ingest lead shot from carcasses of animals killed with lead-based ammunition.
But condors are not the only victims. Lead is a leading threat to all national park birdlife, especially bald eagles, hawks, and other raptors. Lead fragments from spent shells contaminate the entire wildlife food chain.
It’s time for decisive action to protect the wildlife that our national parks were created to preserve.
While most parks by law do not permit hunting, a significant number do. Of the 429 national parks, 76 allow various types of hunting—recreational, subsistence, or tribal hunting. These parks (the largest of which are in Alaska) cover more than 60% of land within the entire national park system. In addition, more than 85% of parks with fish (213 in all) are open for fishing with lead tackle.
The impact is devastating. More than 130 park wildlife species are exposed to or killed by ingesting lead or prey contaminated with lead.
These wildlife deaths are preventable. Since November of 2022, Interior Secretary Deborah Haaland, the cabinet officer overseeing the National Park Service, has had a proposed rule sitting on her desk that would end the use of lead-based ammunition and fishing tackle in all park units. Despite this, no action has been taken on this rule-making petition.
In contrast to the Park Service’s total inaction, its sister agency, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, (FWS) has declared that “lead ammunition and tackle have negative impacts on both wildlife and human health.” The FWS has taken the first tentative steps to reduce or eliminate the use of lead ammunition by:
Though these steps do not constitute a complete ban on lead ammunition, they represent a significant step forward, especially considering that nearly 80% of wildlife refuges and other management districts offer hunting and fishing access.
Unfortunately, wildlife protection does not appear to be a high priority for National Park Service Director Chuck Sams and his leadership team. Earlier this year, he approved questionable hunting practices, such as killing bear cubs and wolf pups in their dens, using dogs and artificial lights to hunt black bears, and shooting swimming caribou from motorboats across more than 22 million acres of Park Service administered lands in Alaska.
These are not the actions of a conservation-focused agency.
Banning lead from our national parks would be one of the single biggest conservation advances in a generation. Such a move would place the Park Service alongside 26 states and countries that have already banned lead ammunition.
The ecological stakes are profound. It’s time for decisive action to protect the wildlife that our national parks were created to preserve.