What environmental agency firings could mean for energy, pollution, national parks

The consequences of the Trump administration firing thousands of environmental employees from the federal government could range from worsened responses to pollution to less access at national parks, former federal officials are warning.

Late last week, the administration fired thousands of “probationary” officials — those who had been employed for a relatively short period of time — at various agencies including the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Interior Department.

The EPA let nearly 400 staffers go while the Interior Department lost 2,300. That’s about 3 percent of each agency’s workforce.

While the job functions of those let go are not fully clear, former officials say the cuts could hamstring the agencies’ abilities to carry out their missions.

“The public health is going to be at risk, and certainly environmental protection,” said Jennifer Orme-Zavaleta, who worked at the EPA for about 40 years.

“If there were some kind of an environmental incident, if it was another East Palestine train wreck. We just had the wildfires in California. … It's going to be difficult to mount a federal response to help out, and that's going to put a huge added burden on states who are already under-resourced to deal with these things,” she said.

The EPA said last week that the firings came after “a thorough review of agency functions in accordance with President Trump’s executive orders.”

“EPA has followed standard protocols and procedures, ensuring impacted staff received notification of their status. President Trump was elected with a mandate to create a more effective and efficient federal government that serves all Americans, and we are doing just that,” the agency said.

The EPA is in charge of protecting human health and the environment, including by setting limits on pollution and responding to contamination. Meanwhile, the Interior Department’s broad mission includes national parks, endangered species, energy development on public lands and tribal affairs.

It’s not entirely clear how many staffers came from each program. The Washington Post reported that 1,000 national parks workers were fired, though the National Park Service is reinstating seasonal job offers for 5,000 people.

Phil Francis, a former National Park Service official who, among other roles, was superintendent of the Blue Ridge Parkway, said that for national parks alone, the consequences of the firings could be far-reaching.

"They're going to find visitor centers likely to be closed in places. Restrooms are not going to be as clean. If something goes wrong, they're going to have a harder time finding someone to report to. It may take longer for emergency personnel to reach someone," said Francis, who is now the chair of the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks.

He added that while seasonal workers are also important, permanent employees need to be in place to train and supervise them.

Laura Daniel-Davis, who was the Interior Department’s acting No. 2 official during the Biden administration, warned that getting rid of staff, particularly at the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), could hamper the Trump administration’s own energy goals.

“A primary focus for us in terms of hiring for BLM over the last year, which is that probationary period ... were people who do the permitting,” Daniel-Davis told The Hill, referring to a step in the process needed to get energy projects up and running on federal lands.

“Yes, it's the renewables, but it's also oil and gas. It's transmission line permitting, and we saw a lot more of those applications coming in the door. It's critical minerals permitting,” she added. “A lot of those BLM workers — they work on permitting writ large.”

Since taking office, the Trump administration has declared that the nation is facing an emergency when it comes to energy and has vowed to produce more of it (though it has also sought to halt renewable energy projects). It said it would cut “burdensome” regulations the EPA.

Orme-Zavaleta said that similarly cutting EPA workers could slow down that process of reversing President Biden's regulations.

“The administration is going to find it very difficult to achieve their other goals, whether it's rolling back regulations or trying to get new ones out, because they're not going to have enough people there to do the work,” she said.

Stan Meiburg, who worked at the EPA for 39 years, said that firing probationary employees — who tend to be early in their careers — can have lasting impacts.

“It means that you're debilitating the next generation of leadership, because those employees are ones who, if they stay with the agency over five to 10 years, will develop the knowledge of environmental programs, of agency workings, of law and all those things, and become effective leaders for the next generation,” he said.

“It's really disabling for the long term future of the institution,” Meiburg added.

The firing of probationary workers does not appear to be the only source of staff losses at each agency. E&E News reported that 2,700 Interior employees took Trump’s buyout offer.

Meanwhile, the EPA put about 170 staff members on leave because they worked on an issue known as “environmental justice,” which seeks to help communities that are overburdened by pollution.

This work includes a focus on minority and low-income neighborhoods, which face on average a greater amount of pollution. Earlier this month, the EPA cited the Trump administration’s order relating to federal diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) staff and said the agency was “in the process of evaluating new structure and organization to ensure we are meeting our mission of protecting human health and the environment for all Americans.”

However, opponents of this move warned that it could leave more Americans dealing with unhealthy levels of pollution.

"It means that the communities who have often been unseen, unheard, unprotected, no longer have the advocate inside the agency to make sure that they have the ability to have those basic human rights of breathing clean air, drinking clean water, and not having to live on soil that's filled with toxins,” said Mustafa Santiago Ali, a former EPA official.

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What environmental agency firings could mean for energy, pollution, national parks

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