On February 12, the Trump Administration revoked the 2009 scientific finding by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that greenhouse gas emissions endanger human health and welfare. Known as the “endangerment finding,” this ruling formed the basis for the EPA’s regulation of greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles and power plants until last week. The government simultaneously repealed all regulations on greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks.  

The official announcement is titled Rescission of the Greenhouse Gas Endangerment Finding and Motor Vehicle Greenhouse Gas Emission Standards Under the Clean Air Act. It’s published in the Federal Register, which is basically a blog where the US Government posts all its official documents.

No one should be surprised.

The Administration announced last August they were considering this change. At that time, I wrote a detailed post with background information about why this is so important. The EPA held public hearings a few weeks later. You can read my testimony here.  

Even though Trump still refers to the climate crisis as a “hoax” and a “scam,” his administration is not directly challenging the science underlying the endangerment finding. I guess they’re not complete fools: the evidence for anthropogenic (human-caused) climate change has become overwhelming since 2009.  

Instead, they’re claiming that the Clean Air Act (CAA), and specifically section 202(a)(1), does not authorize the EPA to regulate greenhouse gasses. That’s because climate change is a global problem and they say the CAA authorizes the EPA to regulate only local or regional pollutants. Further, they claim, any regulation of greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles would have an insignificant effect on reducing global greenhouse gas emissions while imposing huge costs on the US economy.  

Now these arguments aren’t new. The United States Supreme Court addressed them in a 2007 case called Massachusetts v. EPA. In that case, by a narrow 5-4 majority, the Court ruled that the EPA did have the authority to regulate greenhouse gasses under the CAA. Since 2007, however, all five justices in that majority have either resigned or died. And in 2022, the Supreme Court introduced its so-called “major questions doctrine” under which the Court requires Congress to clearly authorize government agencies like the EPA to undertake regulatory programs with significant economic or political impact. (There’s no clear definition of what “significant” means here. The Court gets to decide case-by-case.)  

The Trump Administration seems to be betting that the Supreme Court will overrule Massachusetts v. EPA if the inevitable lawsuits over its rescission of the endangerment finding ever reach the Court. Given the current composition of the Supreme Court and its open hostility to environmental regulation, there’s a good chance the Administration will win that bet. If they do, then any future Administration would need Congress to pass legislation explicitly authorizing the EPA to regulate greenhouse gasses. And of course there’s no way the current Republican-controlled Congress would ever pass such legislation.

So what happens now? 

Well, first come the lawsuits. They’ve already started. A group of health, environmental, and scientific groups launched a lawsuit on February 18. More will follow. These suits will work their way through the courts, most likely ending up before the Supreme Court in the next couple of years.  

Meanwhile, the government says it will revoke any and all remaining regulations relating to greenhouse gas emissions.  

As a result, our air will become more polluted. More people will die of asthma and other respiratory illnesses. More people will die in forest fires, floods and other extreme weather events. 

Protected by tariffs and lax regulation, the US auto industry will reduce its already lackluster investments in electric vehicles and fuel economy improvements. As a result, US car companies will fall further and further behind competitors from China and other countries and they’ll lose market share globally. Meanwhile, they’ll continue selling dirtier, costlier cars to Americans until their financial positions becomes so weak that they’ll slither up to the public trough begging for yet another government bailout. It wouldn’t surprise me if this happened within the next five years.

Yet the energy transition away from fossil fuels will continue. Renewable energy is cheaper and cleaner and will eventually win in the marketplace. But here in the US the transition will happen more slowly without the regulations based on the endangerment finding.

If there’s any silver lining to this awful dark cloud, it’s the possibility that States could regulate greenhouse gas emissions more aggressively once the federal government abandons the field. Normally federal laws and regulations preempt State efforts. But with the federal government claiming it lacks authority, and the current Congress unwilling to pass legislation giving it that authority, the way could be open for States to act.  

But that’s a faint hope and it’s years away.  

Rescinding the endangerment finding is yet another action in the Trump Administration’s unrelenting attack on renewable energy which already includes eliminating tax credits for EVs, a “blockade” stalling deployments of solar and wind power generation, and attempts to resurrect the coal industry.

These policies are all designed to prop up and prolong the demand for fossil fuels.

Trump and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin crowed that rescinding the endangerment finding is the “single largest deregulatory action” in US history. In fact, I think it’s the single greatest payoff to the fossil fuel industry in US history. 

No one should be surprised. 

The fossil fuel industry spent upwards of $450-million helping Trump and Republicans in the 2024 election cycle. Now, they’re getting the best government money can buy.  

Thanks for reading.  

Related Links 

President Trump and Administrator Zeldin Deliver Single Largest Deregulatory Action in U.S. History, EPA press release. Feb. 12, 2026. 

Lisa Friedman. Trump Administration Erases the Government’s Power to Fight Climate Change. New York Times, Feb. 12, 2026. 

Lisa Friedman. Candidate Trump Promised Oil Exscutives a Windfall. Now, They’re Getting it. New York Times, July 20, 2025. 

Kiley Bense. ‘We Will See Them in Court’: Environmental Lawyers Vow to Challenge Trump’s Repeal of Key Climate Finding. Inside Climate News, Feb. 12, 2026.  

Dharna Noor. Trump’s repeal of landmark Obama-era climate rule: four key takeaways. The Guardian, Feb. 14, 2026.  

Dharna Noor. Environmental groups sue Trump’s EPA over repeal of landmark climate finding. The Guardian, Feb. 18, 2026.

Trump’s Assault on the Clean Air Act and What Comes Next (Spotify, Apple) 
Episode of the Shift Key podcast hosted by Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins, Feb. 16, 2026.