What’s at Stake in November

Erin Brockovich

Every day, I get emails from people asking for help. They think I’m a lawyer. I’m not. They want to know what caused their cancer or why their farm has tested high for chemicals they’ve never heard of. They want someone to fight for them.

The recent Supreme Court decision overturning the 40-year-old Chevron precedent, which allowed federal agencies to interpret the laws they oversee, should wake us up to how truly alone we are when it comes to environmental health protections. If Donald Trump wins in November, things could go from bad to worse. Progress to protect Americans from dangerous chemicals could reach a standstill.

I could list dozens, if not thousands, of contaminants we come in contact with, some regulated by federal and state agencies, and others not. I’ll focus on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, a class of thousands of synthetic chemicals that are finally being recognized for the damage they cause.

PFAS are known as “forever chemicals” because they persist in the environment and in human bodies for decades. These chemicals have been used to make common items from textiles to adhesives to food packaging to firefighting foams to nonstick cookware.

The health problems associated with exposure to PFAS include fertility issues, developmental delays in children and increased risk of certain cancers and of obesity, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Scientists have detected PFAS chemicals in the blood of almost all Americans.

What’s frustrating is that we’ve known for decades which industries use these chemicals, and we’ve known they are accumulating in the environment. But companies and our regulators delayed action.

Take just one example. From the 1950s through the 1970s, 3M dumped its PFAS waste into pits around Minnesota’s eastern Twin Cities metro area. That led to a more than 150-square-mile plume of contaminated groundwater. Subsequent testing revealed that by 2004, more than 140,000 Minnesotans had tainted drinking water. Years later, a young woman named Amara Strande grew up near the plume.

In 2023, Ms. Strande testified in front of Minnesota lawmakers in support of legislation that would restrict PFAS, which she believed caused her rare form of liver cancer. She died weeks before legislation known as Amara’s Law banned the use of PFAS in Minnesota. She was 20 years old. There are more cases like hers.

The number of U.S. communities reportedly contaminated with PFAS compounds continues to grow. Last year, one or more types of PFAS were detected in almost half of the nation’s tap water. People like to talk about the risks of federal oversight and regulations. But without those basic guardrails in place, large companies get to do whatever they want, and hard-working Americans get sick.

Some much needed action was taken on PFAS at the national level recently. In April, the E.P.A. mandated that municipal water systems remove six PFAS chemicals from tap water. Such efforts are now at risk.

Under the Supreme Court’s recent Chevron ruling, federal judges get the final say on how laws including the Clean Water Act and the Safe Drinking Water Act should be applied. This weakens the ability of regulatory agencies to do their jobs protecting the public’s health from problems such as PFAS. Future pollution cases could meander through the federal court system for years while drinking water remains contaminated.

Companies will take advantage of this ruling. Water utility and chemical manufacturing companies have filed challenges with the E.P.A., calling the rule “arbitrary, capricious, and an abuse of discretion.”

Now imagine you take these kneecapped regulations and pair them with a second Trump presidency. President Trump rolled back decades of clean-water protections and dozens of environmental rules. The E.P.A. is still reeling from the exodus of more than 1,200 scientists and policy experts during his administration. One of his political appointees meddled with a PFAS assessment, weakening the toxicity value of a chemical.

The E.P.A. already had its problems, but the agency fared even worse under Mr. Trump. He repeatedly tried to slash the E.P.A.’s budget and many staff members fled, meaning fewer inspectors, fewer resources to study the impact of toxins and more companies contravening environmental regulations.

I recently reviewed Project 2025, a playbook for the first 180 days of the potential next Trump administration. (Mr. Trump says he doesn’t support the project, though many of his former White House employees are involved.) In the E.P.A. chapter, PFAS are mentioned twice. Project 2025 says the administration should revise groundwater cleanup regulations and policies to reflect the challenges of contaminants such as PFAS, which seems fair. But then it also says the administration should revisit the E.P.A. designation of PFAS chemicals as “hazardous substances” under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), also known as Superfund. That seems contradictory and ill advised. The designation helps make available CERCLA’s enforcement tools and cost recovery, ensuring that the polluters, not taxpayers, fund or conduct investigations and cleanup.

I’m not giving Democratic administrations a pass. We need more accountability for the environmental ills that have passed under their watch. These include the water crisis in Flint, Mich., and Jackson, Miss. The state and federal responses to the toxic train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, left much to be desired. We must expect more from those we put in office; our lives depend on it.

The E.P.A. used to have bipartisan support. The Reagan administration changed that when President Ronald Reagan appointed a corporation-friendly E.P.A. administrator who railed against government regulation.

Rules are effective only if they can be enforced. State and federal agencies have done a poor job of building meaningful enforcement into the well-intentioned regulations that have been enacted, and they must do better. Americans’ health is at risk.