And stop feeding off the taxpayer trough. From Business Insider:
EPA staffers warn of a huge exodus if Trump wins again. 'We can't do four more years of this.'
Career employees at the Environmental Protection Agency were devastated when Donald Trump became president.Nearly four years later, EPA staff and former officials said Trump has politicized and dismantled the agency beyond recognition. According to them, industry interests now have an "overriding voice" there. "I think many of the long-term employees will be able to exhale and get back to business," a longtime EPA official said of the prospect of a Joe Biden win in November.In an exclusive interview, EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said he planned to lead the agency "for at least the next two to three years."Environmentalists and ex-EPA staffers are thinking about ways to revive the agency but say it's going to be a monumental task. "You have to get this agency from a fetal position into Superman," a union official said.
When Donald Trump clinched the presidency in 2016, employees at the Environmental Protection Agency wept. They'd watched as Trump pledged on the campaign trail to slash their agency. Staffers feared their jobs would be cut and that eight years of work drafting environmental policies for the Obama administration would be flushed down the drain. "We had tears when this man won the election," said Gary Morton, a 26-year EPA veteran who retired last year and now leads a union representing about 7,500 agency employees nationwide. "He ran on a platform of killing the Environmental Protection Agency. Three and a half years later, EPA staff and former leaders who served under both Republican and Democratic presidents said Trump and his team have dismantled the agency charged with safeguarding the nation's air, water, and public health even further than they expected. Beyond the administration trashing former President Barack Obama's signature environmental policies, Trump's critics say it has sidelined scientists, sent veteran staffers packing, and blocked meaningful action on climate change.It has all taken a toll on staff, said an EPA employee who spoke with Insider on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to talk to the press. Workers inside the agency are looking toward the November presidential election thinking, "Holy s---, we can't do four more years of this," the employee said. Staff said they've held on by hoping that Trump would serve only a single term.They said they've felt left out of the agency's inner circle and distrusted by political appointees. For a while, they were even physically blocked from getting anywhere close to the administrator's office. Another EPA employee said for the career staff at the agency those who aren't political appointees "unquestionably, people are holding on and looking forward and counting the days." If Trump is reelected, staffers said, they're expecting many of their colleagues to leave the agency.
For now, EPA employees are quietly discussing how the agency might be overhauled if presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden ousts Trump in November - a prospect many of them would embrace, according to a dozen interviews with current and former staffers and former EPA administrators who served under presidents from both parties. If there's a change in administration, "I think many of the long-term employees will be able to exhale and get back to business," a longtime EPA official said.
Heh - the EPA needs to stick to its charter. When it was founded in 1970 (Executive Order from President Richard M. Nixon), it was sorely needed. We had major air, water and soil pollution. We had a river in Ohio that caught fire. We had sewerage being dumped from our cities into our rivers. We had Tetra-ethyl Lead used in our gasoline (it makes engines run a lot better).
BUT. They did their work and they got us cleaned up and got us understanding that it is better to stay clean than to go back to our polluting ways. So... What do they do? They grow and metastasize and creep and become this huge bureaucracy that can never shrink, it can never be downsized and it will never die.
The EPA does fill a need but a greatly reduced one. They should have their funding cut by 80% and they should move their headquarters to Kansas City and get out of the D.C. swamp. Anything else is a waste of our hard-earned money.
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