SEATTLE — Washington state will launch another lawsuit against President Trump if he proceeds with plans to ease regulations on coal-fired power plants.
Gov. Jay Inslee made the announcement today, while skies were obscured by smoke from wildfires.
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“Pools are closed down in Wenatchee and the Tri-Cities. Our kids can't go out and go swimming, for goodness' sakes. Those kids deserve clean air,” the governor said.
Inslee blames the fires on hotter, drier weather; the hotter, drier weather on climate change; and climate change on carbon pollution that comes, in part, from coal-fired power plants such as the TransAlta plant in Centralia.
On Tuesday, Trump's Environment Protection Agency proposed to make it easier to burn coal for electricity.
“We are putting our great coal miners back to work,” the president said to cheers in West Virginia.
Inslee responded, “What we know is this rule not only forces us to breath more coal smoke, it forces us to breath more smoke from burning forests.”
Trump's new Affordable Clean Energy Rule relaxes power plant pollution standards, but critics say it will allow more particulates related to heart and lung disease, and the EPA itself says that will contribute to 1,400 more premature deaths per year.
“I think it is fair to say that Donald Trump is an unindicted co-conspirator in the premature death of 1,400 people every year if this misbegotten plan went into place,” Inslee said in a reference to the guilty plea Tuesday of Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, which says Trump directed him to violate campaign finance law.
Now, Washington state will sue President Trump if he goes ahead with his latest plan to change environmental law.
“Time and time again, federal courts have ruled that federal agencies cannot ignore the causes and the effects of climate change when they make decisions that affect the environment.,” said Assistant Attorney General Bill Sherman.
Inslee said efforts to reduce carbon pollution in Washington will continue no matter what the federal government does.
And that includes the closure of the Centralia coal-fired power plant in 2025.
Cox Media Group
