Project 2025 Would Make It Easier for Big Corporations To Dump Dangerous Toxins That Poison Americans

Nine years ago, Deanna Branch’s younger son, Aidan, was poisoned by lead. He was exposed through lead service lines that provided water for the family’s home in Milwaukee. Aidan was hospitalized twice and will face lifelong health consequences.

State Rep. Wendy E. N Thomas (D) lives in Merrimack, New Hampshire, 3 miles from a manufacturing plant that released toxic PFAS chemicals into her community. In 2022, Rep. Thomas was diagnosed with breast cancer. She has since undergone a double mastectomy and has plans to remove her ovaries and fallopian tubes.*

These stories are only two examples of the millions of American families who have experienced harm from environmental toxins in the water they drink and the air they breathe. Yet far-right extremists want to make it easier for corporations to poison people. The Project 2025 playbook proposes replacing tens of thousands of career civil servants, such as scientists at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), with far-right, nonexpert loyalists to usher in a radical agenda that would make it easier for big corporations to dump dangerous toxins into the U.S. water supply and air. This would place corporate profits over the health of the American people and the environment: An April 2024 joint staff report by the Democratic staff of both the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability and the Senate Budget Committee sheds light on how fossil fuel companies have attempted to undermine efforts to curb pollution while they earn record-breaking profits.

These far-right loyalists would seek to erode the fundamental freedom of every American to breathe clean air and drink safe water and, in so doing, would significantly increase the number of Americans suffering from asthma, cancer, heart disease, reproductive health harms, child development delays, and other health conditions.

Specifically, Project 2025 would:

• Neuter the EPA’s ability to safeguard public health and protect Americans’ fundamental right to breathe clean air and drink safe water, pushing the EPA toward obsolescence.
• Dissolve unprecedented U.S. climate, clean energy, and environmental investments that are creating millions of jobs and cutting carbon and local pollution.
• Reverse hard-won progress on protecting Americans from lead poisoning, dangerous forever chemicals, and soot pollution.

Project 2025 would neuter the EPA’s ability to safeguard public health

Project 2025 would drastically reduce the EPA’s powers, hamstringing its unique and crucial role in protecting the lives, well-being, and health of America’s communities and environment. Project 2025’s top EPA priority is to reduce the agency’s size and scope, shrinking and dismantling existing EPA offices and programs. Project 2025 also plans to “pause and review” major rules and guidance that protect the environment and public health—for example, tailpipe emissions limits for cars and light-duty trucks—in order to weaken or eliminate those protections.

Specifically, Project 2025 would:

• Ban EPA research on the cumulative impacts of toxin exposures and obstruct the development of climate mitigation strategies. Project 2025 calls for “the immediate and consistent rejection” of research and science activities under the Office of Research and Development, unless directly authorized by Congress, and for a ban on cumulative impact analysis under the National Environmental Policy Act. Cumulative impact analyses are foundational in addressing the effects of human and environmental exposure to stressors such as pollution, extreme weather, and economic inequality, among others, which can accumulate over time and threaten public health and the environment.
• Eliminate the EPA’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA) and worsen local air and water pollution. Dissolving the OECA will hinder the EPA’s enforcement of landmark environmental laws—including the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Safe Drinking Water Act—that protect human and environmental health and improve U.S. climate resilience.
• Dissolve the EPA’s Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights (OEJECR) and perpetuate environmental and health disparities. The OEJECR provides resources on civil rights, environmental justice, community engagement, and community-led action. Disbanding the OEJECR would threaten $2.7 billion in Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) funding intended to tackle environmental injustices, as well as more than $50 million in grant funding for community-based organizations and organizing efforts to clean up pollution in front-line communities.

Project 2025 would dissolve unprecedented climate, clean energy, and environmental investments

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 provided historic opportunities to reduce pollution, advance environmental justice, bring jobs to communities, and accelerate the transition to a clean energy future. The IRA, along with other new federal investments, has triggered record-setting growth in U.S. clean energy and transportation investments. In just the past year, the IRA spurred $265 billion in public and private investment toward clean energy, clean vehicles, and building electrification, an increase of nearly 40 percent since 2023. The IRA also addresses health burdens and local pollution in communities and will reduce emissions by an estimated 43 percent to 48 percent by 2035.

Project 2025 calls on Congress to halt this climate and health progress by fully repealing all IRA subsidies, including its numerous clean energy and manufacturing credits. Repealing these tax incentives would prevent unprecedented U.S. job growth, stifle clean energy market growth, increase carbon and local pollution, and undermine progress on securing safe and healthy communities for all Americans.

Project 2025 would reverse hard-won progress on protecting Americans from lead poisoning, dangerous forever chemicals, and soot pollution

Project 2025 would “set up ‘pause and review’ teams” to reconsider major EPA rules and guidance that safeguard the environment and public health, with the ultimate goal of weakening or eliminating those protections. This section focuses on Project 2025’s plan to dismantle the Biden-Harris administration’s rules and guidance for three toxins: lead, PFAS, and soot.

Failure to follow through on the Lead and Copper Rule improvements will negate progress to ensure safe drinking water for communities across the country

On November 30, 2023, the EPA announced proposed improvements to strengthen the nation’s Lead and Copper Rule as part of the Biden-Harris administration’s vision for a lead-free future. If Project 2025 were implemented, the Lead and Copper Rule improvements would be at risk—including accelerating the timeline for water systems to replace lead service lines (LSLs) from 30 years to within 10 years.

LSLs serve 9.2 million homes across the United States and are disproportionately present in low-income communities and communities of color. The health crisis in Flint, Michigan, nearly 10 years ago, in which thousands of children suffered health consequences from the contaminated water flowing through lead pipes, serves as a reminder of the dangers of LSLs.

There is no safe level of lead exposure; it causes documented long-term and irreversible health harms, particularly for children. The Lead and Copper Rule improvements will help ensure safe drinking water for communities across the country. Reducing lead exposure would address a variety of lead-related health conditions, including, for adults, heart disease and adverse maternal health outcomes. For children, the improvements would address low birth weight; delayed growth and development; learning disabilities; behavioral challenges, including more severe symptoms of ADHD; and hearing and speech impairments. In fact, according to Environmental Defense Fund research, removing all LSLs across the country would provide approximately $22,000 in societal benefits per LSL removed solely by reducing heart disease deaths among adults over 35 years. These benefits include added economic value and better health outcomes.

Former EPA scientist and Harvard researcher Ronnie Levin estimated that removing all LSLs would provide a total health benefit of $37 billion per year, translating to $4,000 per lead pipe removed per year. Using these data, a Natural Resources Defense Council study found that removing all LSLs would save nearly $786 billion in health-related costs over the next 35 years. The total benefit in the 12 states with the most to gain—Illinois, Ohio, Michigan, New York, New Jersey, Missouri, Wisconsin, Indiana, Texas, Minnesota, Florida, and Pennsylvania—is estimated at up to $555 billion over 35 years. In addition, replacing all LSLs in America would create 56,080 jobs annually for 10 years, according to a study by Environmental Entrepreneurs and the United Association of Union Plumbers and Pipefitters. The study estimated that the $45 billion investment required for this work would generate $104 billion in total economic activity.

Reversing the standard protecting water systems from forever chemicals will have long-standing adverse effects on community health

The Biden-Harris administration has committed to governmentwide agency action to reduce PFAS pollution and protect health. Accordingly, in April 2024, the EPA issued the first-ever national standard to regulate PFAS contaminants in water. The National Primary Drinking Water Regulation regulates seven types of PFAS, setting maximum contaminant levels at an enforceable 4.0 or 10 parts per trillion, depending on the type of PFAS or mixtures of several PFAS, while encouraging a goal of zero containment. If Project 2025 were implemented, this standard would be at risk of pause and review.

The new rule is expected to result in water with lower levels of PFAS for up to 105 million people. Once the rule is fully implemented, it will also help prevent at least 9,600 deaths and 29,900 illnesses that result from developmental and cardiovascular issues, kidney cancer, and bladder cancer. Together, these declines in adverse health outcomes would result in nearly $1.5 billion in health benefits per year. Benefits from the rule—and funding available through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 for water system improvements to comply with the rule—will have outsize impacts on communities of color, low-income communities, and rural communities that are already disproportionately burdened by PFAS exposure.

Rolling back the EPA’s new rule on soot pollution will be disastrous for national air quality and the health of vulnerable communities

Particulate matter, or soot, is the deadliest of all air pollution, responsible for an estimated 48,000 premature deaths in the United States every year. It is primarily produced through fossil fuel combustion in industries, power plants, and vehicles. In February 2024, the EPA strengthened the Clean Air Act limit on soot pollution from the previous limit of 12 micrograms per cubic meter to a new, annual, health-based standard of 9 micrograms per cubic meter. If Project 2025 were implemented, the soot limit would be at risk of pause and review.

The new limit will yield an estimated $18 billion in benefits for the Northeastern United States, $5.3 billion for the Southeast, and $2.3 billion for Western states. The state of California alone will see $21 billion in benefits: All but four California counties reporting data have a failing grade for soot pollution levels, which are increasing in severity. This limit will require counties to implement measures that reduce the concentration of soot, improving air quality for communities across the country, especially those most burdened by this deadly form of pollution.

By 2032, the new soot limit will deliver an estimated $46 billion in net health benefits and prevent up to 4,500 premature deaths, 5,700 new cases of asthma, 2,000 emergency room visits, and 290,000 lost workdays. In this time frame, nearly all counties in the United States would meet the revised standard, and for every $1 spent to comply with this rule, there would be up to $77 in human health benefits. The revised standard will also help reduce harms from deadly air pollution in low-income communities and communities of color, which are disproportionately exposed to soot pollution and face higher health risks. In the past decade, the disparity in soot-related premature deaths between white communities and communities of color has increased by 16 percent. Reverting back to the EPA’s previous soot standard would put the lives of millions of Americans at risk and prolong the health burdens of vulnerable communities.

The Biden-Harris administration has made important progress toward creating a reality in which Americans have clean air, clean drinking water, and healthy communities—including the EPA’s recent rulemaking on lead, PFAS, soot pollution, and other toxins. Project 2025 would reverse that progress, with Americans’ health paying the price.

Conclusion

Project 2025’s deregulation agenda will dramatically limit the nation’s ability to understand, monitor, and mitigate Americans’ exposure to dangerous environmental toxins that put their health at serious risk. Americans’ health and lives would be the collateral damage of increasing power for corporations driven primarily by profits—corporations that have already failed to keep communities safe from pollution. Reversing these regulations, as far-right extremists intend to do, would rob Americans of their fundamental rights to breathe clean air and drink safe water and would have disastrous health and economic effects for decades to come.

* Authors’ note: Deanna Branch’s story and quote were provided to the Center for American Progress via phone and email on July 2, 2024. State Rep. Wendy E. N Thomas’ story and quote were provided to CAP via phone and email on July 8, 2024.

The authors would like to thank CAP colleagues and external reviewers for their insights and feedback. They also thank the storytellers for sharing their stories.