The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is placing staffers who signed a letter of dissent against the Trump administration’s actions and policies on leave.
The EPA says it has placed 144 staffers on administrative leave as it investigates the letter. It’s not entirely clear whether they will face further punishment after the probe.
“The Environmental Protection Agency has a zero-tolerance policy for career bureaucrats unlawfully undermining, sabotaging, and undercutting the administration’s agenda as voted for by the great people of this country last November,” EPA spokesperson Brigit Hirsch said in a written statement.
In a letter made public on Monday, current and former EPA staffers said that the administration’s policies “undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment.”
They expressed concerns about five issues in particular, saying that the administration is undermining public trust, ignoring scientific consensus to benefit polluters, reversing EPA’s progress in America’s most vulnerable communities, dismantling the Office of Research and Development and promoting a culture of fear.
“Your decisions and actions will reverberate for generations to come. EPA under your leadership will not protect communities from hazardous chemicals and unsafe drinking water, but instead will increase risks to public health and safety,” the staffers wrote to Administrator Lee Zeldin.
In response, the EPA said Monday that it would “continue to work with states, tribes, and communities to advance the agency’s core mission of protecting human health and the environment.”