A report led by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. released Thursday blames “corporate influence” and “active government lobbying” for the fact that kids are regularly exposed to toxic chemicals.
It doesn’t mention that such influence is coming from inside the Trump administration.
The Make America Healthy Again report cites statistics from the government transparency website OpenSecrets to demonstrate corporate influence on chemical regulation, chiefly that in 2023, some 60 percent of chemical-sector lobbyists had previously held federal posts.
“As a result of this influence, the regulatory environment surrounding the chemical industry may reflect a consideration of its interests,” the report says. The MAHA report purports to be a break from that, with President Donald Trump himself celebrating its release Thursday by crowing that, “unlike other administrations, we will not be silenced or intimidated by the corporate lobbyists or special interests.”
In reality, multiple Trump appointees currently at EPA previously worked at the agency during Trump’s first term. And in between his presidencies, those officials represented the chemical industry, often as attorneys, opposing EPA regulations. After just a few months back at the agency, these officials have helped shepherd the regulatory rollbacks they advocated on the outside.
Take Lynn Ann Dekleva, who in 2023 was a senior director at the American Chemistry Council. She has not ever been a registered lobbyist, but ACC spent $15.7 million on lobbying in 2023, making it the top spender that year, according to OpenSecrets. Dekleva is now back at EPA, this time as the deputy assistant administrator at EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.
During the time Dekleva was at ACC, the group opposed first-ever drinking water regulations for PFAS, which can cause cancer and disrupt hormone systems even at low doses. In April 2024 ACC slammed new PFAS standards finalized by the Biden administration limiting six PFAS compounds in drinking water. The group said the rules had been written using a “rushed, unscientific approach” that is “unacceptable when it comes to an issue as important as access to safe drinking water.”
Those standards were partially rolled back by the Trump EPA earlier this month, which will now only limit two PFAS compounds in drinking water. ACC celebrated in a May 15 press release that called the Biden rule a “flawed regulation.”
The MAHA report lists PFAS among seven groups of chemicals where industry influence has prevented adequate regulation. But it heralds EPA’s May announcement as “in line with a new agency-wide strategy.”
Asked about the omission in the MAHA report this week, EPA spokesperson Molly Vaseliou accused the Biden administration of skipping steps to regulate the other four PFAS.
Still, EPA says the agency is “committed to addressing PFAS in drinking water” and ensuring its regulations “follow the law, follow the science,and can be implemented by water systems to strengthen public health protections.”
Public health experts say there is a discrepancy between the MAHA report’s purported aims and the Trump administration’s actual actions.
“It is impossible to read this report and not be struck by the disconnect between what Kennedy is proposing and what he and his minions are doing to destroy the agencies that have the experience, the know-how and the people to translate his noble ideas into action,” said Dr. Phil Landrigan, a pediatrician focused on environmental exposures and the director of Boston College’s global public health program.
During an event celebrating the report Thursday, Kennedy implied that it won’t necessarily come with new regulations: “This administration has the bravery to tell the truth and solve problems through innovation and not nanny-state regulation.”
Asked why the MAHA report omitted the Trump administration’s own conflicts of interest, HHS spokesperson Emily Hilliard in response to questions said the report “does not make policy or personnel recommendations,” it “highlights systemic issues and industry interests that dominate and distort public health.”
Vaseliou in response to similar conflict-of-interest questions said that “President Trump made fantastic choices” in selecting Dekleva and Nancy Beck, current head of the agency’s chemicals office and fellow ex-ACC employee.
“They are highly qualified and dedicated public servants, and some of the brightest minds in their field committed to upholding EPA’s mission of protecting human health and the environment,” Vaseliou said, adding that “every Trump political appointee works with the career employees in the EPA Ethics Office to ensure all applicable ethics obligations are addressed.”
According to documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, the ethics office recently cleared Beck and Dekleva to work on particular toxics law issues involving their former clients.
The determinations allows the two to ignore the standard one-year “cooling off” period meant to minimize conflicts of interest, because “the interest of the United States Government in your participation outweighs any concerns about your impartiality,” according to the memos written by ethics official Justina Fugh.
When Beck worked in the Trump White House during his previous administration, she pressured EPA to write loopholes into PFAS regulations.
When she was at EPA overseeing chemical policy eight years ago, she directed EPA civil servants to downplay the ecological damage caused by pesticides and weedkillers like atrazine.
And under the last Trump administration, EPA increased the amount of atrazine it considered safe for frogs and other aquatic organisms in a move that the Biden-era EPA later criticized as politically motivated rather than science-based.
Beck has returned to EPA, this time as a senior adviser to the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.
Other Trump EPA officials previously worked on behalf of chemical companies.
There’s Steven Cook, deputy assistant administrator for the Office of Land and Emergency Management, who previously worked at the law firm Bracewell representing American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers in a lawsuit over a rule designating two PFAS as hazardous substances under federal Superfund law.
Peggy Browne is the acting assistant administrator of the Office of Water, which sets allowable water levels for contaminants for MAHA-targeted contaminants, including PFAS and fluoride.
As of 2023, Browne was a lobbyist for CropLife America, an agricultural trade group defending the very “crop protection tools” singled out in the MAHA report, such as atrazine, glyphosate and other concerning chemicals where industry influence has stymied regulation.
CropLife America President and CEO Alexandra Dunn in a statement said the report “unfairly casts doubt on the integrity of the federal review process” and “will stir unjustified fear and confusion among American consumers who live in the country with the safest and most abundant food supply.”
Dunn previously served alongside Beck and Dekleva as the assistant administrator of EPA’s chemicals office during Trump’s first administration.
The report specifically cites financial reports from major chemical manufacturers like Bayer and Syngenta to raise awareness that the companies fund research into the safety of their own chemicals. Those industry-funded studies are, in turn, less likely to find adverse health effects from herbicides like atrazine than independently funded research, the MAHA report says, citing a 2017 study.
“Such biases amplify potential discrepancies in the literature and limit the scientific publication of unfavorable results,” the report says.
Zeldin’s top agricultural aide was plucked directly from Corteva Agriscience, a company specializing in those crop-protection chemicals spun off from chemical giant DuPont.
Turner Bridgforth, joined the administrator’s office as its senior agricultural adviser last month, according to his LinkedIn profile. Bridgforth was listed as a lobbyist in Corteva’s most recent financial disclosure report for the first quarter of fiscal 2025.
In anticipation of the MAHA report’s release, farm chemical associations wrote letters to lawmakers and circulated a petition to Zeldin and Trump requesting they make sure the report doesn’t include “misinformation about pesticides” that could lead to increased regulation.
When asked about his approach to pesticide oversight conflicting with MAHA, Zeldin said “it’s important to follow the science,” on a podcast released last week.
Zeldin pointed to fluoride in drinking water as “a good example as to how we’ll approach it.” Zeldin alongside Kennedy last month announced EPA would undergo another review process to decide if the agency’s legal limits of the tooth-strengthening chemicals should be lowered, one of the MAHA movement’s pillars.
Zeldin on the podcast appearance also emphasized the increased protections possible through technological advancements, adding “a good goal is to make it more affordable for farmers to be able to invest” and “acquire innovations.”
The Center for Biological Diversity, which has an active lawsuit against EPA to force it to ban atrazine, criticized the Trump administration for failing to address the same chemicals the MAHA report highlights.
“The report’s acknowledgment of pesticides’ risks to our children’s health is a small step forward,” said CBD Environmental Health Director Lori Ann Burd. “But it’s clear that Big Ag was successful in strong-arming EPA Administrator [Lee] Zeldin, Agriculture Secretary [Brooke] Rollins and their puppets in Congress to make sure this administration’s focus will continue to be on protecting not American’s health, but industry profits.”
Reporter Kevin Bogardus contributed.
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