"It's #DEI being treated like a four-letter word," said Linda Birnbaum, a retired toxicologist & fmr director of the National Institute of #Environmental #Health #Sciences who spent 19 years at the #EPA. "People who are already most impacted by high #pollution are going to be most hurt by the loosening of #regulations."

3 #environmental researchers & 5 fmr #EPA ofcls interviewed by Reuters say the end of the EPA's #DEI & #EnvironmentalJustice programs—which seek to ensure a healthy #environment for *minority* groups that often live closest to sources of contamination - will be most felt in #Black & #Hispanic [& #Latin] communities that have long endured the harmful effects of #pollution.

The #Trump admin's press release announcing the end of the lawsuit said the dismissal fulfilled Trump's Day One #ExecutiveOrder to eliminate #diversity, #equity & #inclusion, & that it aligned with the #EPA's new pledge to "end the use of '#EnvironmentalJustice' as a tool for advancing ideological priorities."
[read as opposite of what they say]

Gerard lives along the #MississippiRiver, just a few blocks from a synthetic rubber plant that the admin of fmr President Joe #Biden sued, claiming it posed an imminent #PublicHealth hazard. Gerard, like more than 90% of people living within 1 mile (1.5 km) of the plant, is #Black.

As a doctor in training more than 20 years ago, she cared for a teen boy who died from a degenerative neurological condition linked to his #measles #infection as an infant, when he was too young to be vaccinated.

“There are really bad, scary things that we can protect our #children from,” she said.

#NewMexico officials have tallied 65 cases & one death of an unvaccinated adult. These are the first #deaths from #measles in the #UnitedStates since 2015.

Dr. Alex Cvijanovich, a pediatrician in Albuquerque, said NM has one of the nation’s highest rates of childhood #poverty & says she is terrified about what could happen if the #children’s #vaccine program is scaled back.

#Congress created the #Vaccines for #Children program in 1993 after a US #measles #epidemic had killed dozens of children a few years earlier. The #CDC found
that >50% of the children who got measles then were unvaccinated. The #cost of the #immunization was a primary reason families had skipped the shot even though they were seeing doctors regularly….

At the same time, #HHS canceled about $11 billion in #COVID-related grants to state & local #health departments that were used for a wide variety of #vaccine-related clinics & outreach activities, including for #measles. A federal judge has temporarily blocked the cuts in some states.

The #Vaccines for #Children program funds #vaccine purchases from drug manufacturers including Merck & GlaxoSmithKline at a discount, while state #health departments implement the program & enroll #medical providers. A dose of MMR vaccine costs about $26 under the program compared to $95 in the private sector, acc/to #CDC price list.

…The White House also plans to dismantle a key office in the #housing agency that helps communities recover from deadly #NaturalDisasters, a move that could slow much-needed #emergency #aid. Separately, #Trump issued an #ExecutiveOrder last month eliminating a decades-old, government wide commission meant to coordinate the federal response to #homelessness.

…The expected cuts to #RentalAssistance reflect #Trump’s broader desire to *shrink the footprint of government & its reach into Americans’ lives* [more like kill the #poor, party with the #rich, eradicate the middle], a project that includes sharp #cuts to federal #antipoverty programs viewed as *too generous or wasteful*.

#Project2025’s #RussVought, #Trump’s director of the Office of Management & Budget [#OMB], previously endorsed an end to the federal #voucher program. He [falsely] wrote in 2022 that the #Section8 program in particular “brings with it crime, decreased property values, & results in dependency & subsidized irresponsibility.”

Federal #voucher programs currently provide assistance to ~2.3M #LowIncome #families, acc/to the govt’s estimates, who enroll through their local public-#housing authorities. The #aid is part of a broader universe of #RentalAssistance programs that are set to exceed $54B this fiscal year. But the annual demand for these subsidies is far greater than available funds, creating a sizable wait list as rents are rising nationally.

…the expected overhaul would most likely amount to more than just a technical change, resulting in fewer federal dollars for #LowIncome #families on top of additional cuts planned for the rest of the Dept of #Housing & Urban Development [#HUD]. On Thurs, the #Trump admin took the first steps toward potentially selling the agency’s HQ in Washington.

Admin ofcls recently discussed cutting or canceling out the #vouchers & other #RentalAssistance programs & potentially replacing them with a more *limited* system of #housing grants, perhaps sent to states, acc/to 3 people familiar with the matter…. The overhaul would be included in #Trump’s new #budget, which is expected to be sent to #Congress in the coming weeks.

The potential changes primarily concern federal #housing #vouchers, including those more commonly known as #Section8. The aid generally helps the poorest tenants cover the monthly costs of apartments, town homes & single-family residences.