John,
The news out of Washington, D.C., this week is terrifying and at times overwhelming. Since President Trump took office, four of his executive orders have taken aim at endangered species across the country and seek to decimate Alaska and its wildlife as sacrifices to the fossil fuel industry. More than 1,000 employees of the Environmental Protection Agency who work on life-or-death issues like climate change and clean air and water have been illegally threatened with potential firing. And just yesterday, 170 staff at the EPA’s Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights were placed on administrative leave. This slashing of resources for communities disproportionately harmed by pollution will only increase their health risks.
Most troubling of all, Elon Musk and his lackeys in the pseudo-agency they call the Department of Government Efficiency have destroyed the U.S. Agency for International Development, which had done heroic work to address the illegal wildlife trade; protect elephants, rhinos, and pangolins from extinction; and provided key humanitarian assistance that has saved millions of lives. Now Musk is, in his own words, feeding agencies into the “woodchipper” whenever they don’t agree with him — essentially, launching a hostile private takeover of our country.
This must be stopped.
The federal government and the civil servants who make it run are critical to so many facets of life in the United States. At the Center for Biological Diversity we’re especially concerned about protections for imperiled wildlife, public lands, air, and water — all under threat from Trump, Musk, and the DOGE employees ransacking federal programs and running roughshod over the rule of law.
Tell your representative and senators to act now and stop this takeover by an unelected billionaire.
