THE SET-UP: Nothing in today’s TRIFECTA will shock or surprise you. And maybe that’s the point. While we’ve been fixated on keeping our heads above the flood of informational feces that, as Steve Bannon predicted, has overwhelmed “the zone” … Trump’s regime has engaged in a scorched earth campaign against anything and everything related to “environmental.”
That’s the word Trump uses—“environmental”—and I think purposefully so, too. He’s perfected the use of slight mispronunciation and malapropisms to belittle and trivialize people, places, ideas and issues.
And you’d be hard-pressed to find an issue or a category of government policy Trump has belittled or trivialized more than “environmental.” If his first administration was hostile to the environment and happy to turn regulation over to industry … this second incarnation has been marked by nihilistic contempt for “environmental.”
That’s what I’ve seen nearly every day as I’ve collected stories for the RUNDOWN … a relentless effort to eliminate the environment from government policy as both a priority and a concern. In fact, his regime is removing all environment-related words wherever they appear in official texts. Climate change has been a prime target for this excision, with datasets purged and climate-related terms deemed verboten. The issue is being “disappeared” like a government critic in Pinochet’s Chile.
The issue of forever chemicals may be the one thing they cannot simply dismiss. It’s everywhere and menaces everyone … and we tend to frown on poison in our drinking water. Despite that fact and despite consistent local news coverage in markets large and small, Trump’s EPA still went ahead a pumped the brakes on the long-overdue regulations it inherited.
Yeah, they will anger some people in communities around the country … but it’s not likely to break through and become the kind of national issue that decides elections … you know, like teenage trans athletes. No, the chemical poisoning of the soil, the water and our bodies probably won’t rise to that level or garner the attention we lavish on the culture war. Perish the thought.
In the meantime, Trump’s regime can quietly plan on eliminating the Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, which, as The Washington Post explains, is the “independent agency that investigates chemical disasters — including fatal fires and explosions at chemical plants and oil refineries nationwide.”
Project 2025 architect Russ Vought is behind this move by the Office of Management and Budget. Per WaPo:
The White House Office of Management and Budget wrote in the new documents that closing the Chemical Safety Board would be “part of the Administration’s plans to move the Nation towards fiscal responsibility and to redefine the proper role of the Federal Government.” It added that funding for the board should be “permanently canceled not later than September 30, 2026.”
And still you’re neither shocked nor surprised. It’s understandable. But that’s almost more lamentable than their nihilistic agenda. - jp
TITLE: Alarm sounded over effort to redefine PFAS chemicals
https://www.thenewlede.org/2025/06/alarm-sounded-over-effort-to-redefine-pfas-chemicals/
EXCERPTS: Efforts by an international chemistry industry group to create a new, narrower definition for PFAS chemicals appear to be politically motivated, and could lead to weaker regulations of hazardous compounds, according to a group of international scientists.
The allegations, leveled by 20 scientists from nine countries, were published June 10 in the journal Environmental Science & Technology Letters.
“We are concerned that this effort is politically and/or economically, rather than scientifically, motivated,” the authors wrote. Narrowing the definition of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) could “influence regulatory bodies and others to adopt less protective policies.”
The scientists say they are specifically worried that the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC), a federation of national chemistry societies and other groups representing chemists that calls itself “the world authority on digital standards in chemistry,” is working to redefine the PFAS class of chemicals to exclude fluorinated gases, trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) and fluorinated polymers used in a variety of industries for multiple purposes.
Such fluorinated gases are used in the creation of nuclear energy and the development of pharmaceuticals, while TFA is used to make pesticides and electronics and fluorinated polymers are used for semiconductors and lithium-ion batteries.
While industry groups argue that PFAS are critical to the renewable energy transition, the authors of the journal article state that “claims that certain PFASs are needed to fulfill public health, climate, and infrastructure goals are unrelated to the chemical definition of PFAS.”
The scientists say they support the current definition of PFAS chemicals used by the intergovernmental Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which was proposed in 2021.
The OECD defines PFAS as a class of fluorinated chemicals that contain at least one fully fluorinated methyl or methylene carbon atom. Similar definitions have been adopted by the European Union, at least 24 US states and by Congress through the National Defense Authorization Act.
The OECD definition “is solely based on intrinsic molecular features” and is “scientifically grounded, unambiguous and well suited to identify these chemicals,” the authors state in the journal article. “Justified exemptions can be made by policy makers for specific purposes without changing the general definition of what constitutes a PFAS.”
Some health and environmental advocates push for regulating PFAS as a class, arguing that as one hazardous type of PFAS is phased out, industries simply switch to other PFAS chemicals that are also harmful, such as the company Chemours turning to GenX after the US banned cancer-linked perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) .
PFOA has been classified as carcinogenic to humans by an international cancer research group and linked to a variety of other health effects including reduced vaccine efficacy, but GenX also poses health risks. A 2018 assessment by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) linked the compound – now used in place of PFOA to make many non-stick and water-resistant products – to kidney, blood, immune system and liver damage, as well as to elevated cancer risk.
IUPAC’s move to redefine PFAS comes as the Trump administration last month announced it plans to rescind limits for four types of PFAS in drinking water set during Biden’s presidency and to delay the timeline for water systems to comply with limits on two other PFAS.
Following an executive order freezing new federal regulations after President Trump took office in January, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) withdrew draft guidelines for releases by PFAS manufacturers.
TITLE: 'Forever chemicals' taint more cities' drinking water in U.S.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/06/10/forever-chemicals-cities-drinking-water-epa-data/84027569007/
EXCERPTS: Over the past two years, the EPA has collected complete sets of test results from about 6,900 drinking water systems, with thousands more expected as the PFAS testing initiative continues another year.
USA TODAY’s analysis of these systems with complete results shows nearly a quarter of large water utilities serving at least 100,000 customers exceeded limits the EPA approved last year on two chemicals: PFOS and PFOA.
Water systems in Fairfax County, Virginia, and San Juan, Puerto Rico – each serving over 1 million customers – have now joined the list of utilities with test results that averaged over the limits in the EPA’s latest data.
USA TODAY’s analysis also shows that Tempe, Arizona, which provides water to over 165,000 people, has joined that list. Multiple test locations there failed to meet the EPA standards. PFOS at one sample site averaged 55 parts per trillion (ppt), several times higher than the acceptable limit of 4 ppt.
Altogether, USA TODAY found 774 systems don’t meet the limits for forever chemicals. These utilities will likely need to install advanced filtration systems or find alternative sources of drinking water by 2031.
The deadline for systems to meet the water standards was originally set for 2029, but in May, the EPA proposed an extension and announced it intends to rescind limits on four other types of PFAS set under the Biden administration in 2024.
Advocacy organizations have denounced the EPA’s proposed changes on forever chemicals. Melanie Benesh, vice president of government affairs for the Environmental Working Group, described the move as a “public health betrayal.”
“Communities have waited decades for protection – now the EPA is pulling the rug out,” Benesh said. “Science is clear: PFAS are dangerous even in tiny amounts. The agency must protect all Americans, not just from two chemicals, but from the entire class of harmful PFAS.”
TITLE: New PFAS guidelines spark more ‘do not eat’ warnings for Michigan fish
https://themanchestermirror.com/2025/06/09/new-pfas-guidelines-spark-more-do-not-eat-warnings-for-michigan-fish/
EXCERPTS: Michigan health officials have dramatically reduced the amount of PFAS-tainted fish they consider safe to eat, tripling the number of waterbodies where anglers are warned against eating their catch.
Ninety-eight water bodies are now subject to “do not eat” advisories because fish are contaminated with the so-called “forever chemicals,” up from 33 last year. Hundreds more advisories suggest that Michiganders limit meals of certain fish species to anywhere from 16 servings a month to six a year.
Officials with the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services announced the change Monday while publishing the annual Eat Safe Fish Guide, a document that identifies waterways where fish are contaminated with unsafe levels of toxic chemicals.
The new guidelines, which are warnings to anglers as opposed to enforceable regulations, are six times more stringent than their predecessors. They reflect a growing body of evidence that PFAS is far more toxic than previously thought.
Michigan’s former PFAS fish consumption limits were drafted in 2014, when scientists knew relatively little about the long-term health effects of so-called “forever chemicals” used to make stainproof and waterproof fabrics, silky-smooth hair conditioners and nonstick pans.
Back then, advisories began at 9 parts per billion of PFOS, a PFAS compound, in fish, at which point adults were warned to eat no more than 16 servings a month. A level of 300 parts per billion triggered an all-out “do not eat” warning.
Now, warnings begin at 1.5 parts per billion, with “do not eat” triggered after 49.6 parts per billion, MDHHS spokesperson Lynn Sutfin said.
Exposure to PFAS chemicals has been linked to cancer, thyroid problems and developmental, fertility and immunity challenges. Decades of unregulated use and disposal has allowed the chemicals to spread into the surface and groundwater around the world, including large swaths of Michigan.
In random sampling of Great Lakes fish conducted by the EPA, PFOS was found in every fish.
[Erica Bloom, toxics campaign director at the Ann Arbor-based Ecology Center], lamented that chemical contamination is continuing to deprive Michiganders of a food source and a way of life.
“The real message here,” Bloom said, “is that we have to turn off the tap on these chemicals or we’re never going to get anywhere.”