Constitutional Attacks on the Environment
By Luke Pickrell
Last week, the Senate voted 52-46 to pass a bill that overturns an Environmental Protection Agency regulation limiting seven of the most hazardous air pollutants emitted by chemical plants, oil refineries, and other industrial facilities. The EPA rule states that once a facility emits any of the listed air pollutants at unsafe levels, it must maintain strict pollution controls, even if its emissions later drop to safe levels. The pollutants — including mercury, alkylated lead, and dioxins — are linked to cancer, neurological damage, reproductive harm, and developmental disorders. Even trace exposure can result in severe, long-term health effects.
The bill was introduced under the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to repeal recently enacted regulations within a 60-day window using a simple majority vote. The House is expected to pass the same resolution, and President Trump has said he will sign it into law. If the bill passes the House, it will be the first time in the Clean Air Act’s 55-year history that Congress has scaled back protections.
As I noted in a previous article, the Republicans’ 52-seat Senate majority represents about 25 million fewer Americans than the Democrats’ 48-seat minority. In a democracy governed by universal and equal suffrage, where each person’s vote counted equally, the bill would have failed. But it didn’t fail, because in the Senate, geography trumps demography. And that’s by design.
But no matter; everything about the Senate’s decision to gut environmental protections — to knowingly enable toxic exposure and edge the planet closer to ecological collapse — is fully constitutional. Congress passes laws, the president signs them, and the Supreme Court, already having limited regulatory agency authority in its Chevron decision, gives the final blessing. The system is working exactly as intended — and that is the problem.
As with reproductive rights, gun safety, healthcare, labor protections, and so many other critical issues, the fight to preserve public health and environmental safety cannot be separated from the fight for democracy. The current political order obstructs majority will at every turn.
The Constitution’s denial of democracy is an existential threat to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Without a democratic constitution based on universal and equal rights, including universal and equal suffrage, minority interests will continue driving our country and the world toward the breaking point.