UPDATE—December 14, 2017: After bipartisan opposition, Michael Dourson sent a letter withdrawing his nomination to serve as head of the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention. Thank you to everyone who contacted their Senators and spoke out against this dangerous EPA nominee—your voices made a difference!
It is no secret that President Trump’s nominees to lead America’s environmental programs are intended to undermine and weaken our environmental protections. The current head of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Scott Pruitt, is clearly in the pocket of industry and working on the behalf of polluters, not the public and the environment. The Senate just confirmed Bill Wehrum, a corporate attorney who spent years representing polluting companies, to head EPA’s air program. Kathleen Hartnett White, who has been nominated by Trump to chair the White House’s Council on Environmental Quality, is a climate change skeptic. However, in the midst of this bleak outlook for so many of our federal environmental protections, we still have the chance to stop at least one bad nominee.
Michael Dourson is an adviser to Scott Pruitt and has been nominated by President Trump to be the top chemical safety officer at EPA. Dourson worked as a scientist-for-hire and argued for lower protective standards for dangerous chemicals. For example, when DuPont polluted groundwater with carcinogenic PFOA in West Virginia, the company called in Dourson’s consulting firm, Toxicology Excellence for Risk Assessment (TERA), to convince West Virginia to set a safety threshold for PFOA in drinking water that was thousands of times higher than the level later determined to be unsafe by EPA. TERA was known as the go-to firm for chemical companies that wanted to convince regulators that their products are less dangerous than they actually are. As head of EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, Dourson would lead EPA’s effort to assess the risks of dangerous, often toxic or cancer-causing, chemicals and decide when certain chemicals need further review—chemicals produced by many of the same companies that have paid Dourson handsomely over many years to shield them from regulatory and public scrutiny.
Dourson is so wrong for this job that even senators that normally approve President Trump’s nominees are willing to take a stand—in fact, he might be the first Trump appointee to be defeated by Congress. Just last week, both senators from North Carolina made the surprising announcement that they will oppose Dourson’s confirmation. As senators from a state that has seen the devastating impacts of unregulated chemical pollution, they could not support a nominee that has made a living attempting to demonstrate no health impacts from dangerously high chemical exposure levels. Senator Susan Collins from Maine has also remarked that she is leaning against approving Dourson.
These senators understand that the irresponsible regulation of chemicals can have life-threatening health impacts. This week, please reach out to your Senators and make sure they know that Michael Dourson cannot be trusted to set safety standards for carcinogenic and toxic chemicals. Call them and say:
“My name is [FULL NAME], and I am from [CITY, STATE]. I am calling to urge Senator ______ to oppose Michael Dourson’s nomination to lead EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention. Dourson has made a career as a toxicologist for hire, supporting the chemical industry and undermining facts about the toxic effects of harmful chemicals. When safety standards for toxic and carcinogenic chemicals are weakened, people’s lives are put at risk. Dourson’s past work demonstrates he would be the worst example of the proverbial ‘fox guarding the henhouse.’ He has a clear conflict of interest and cannot be trusted to prioritize human health over industry profit. For the sake of our health and safety, I urge Senator ______ to oppose Dourson’s confirmation and insist on a nominee who will earnestly defend our health and environment from the hazards of toxic chemicals in our air and water.”
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