SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom blasted the Trump administration Feb. 12 for repealing the U.S. EPA’s Endangerment Finding, while ignoring binding law, overwhelming science, and the lived reality of Californians and the American people. This decision overturns the 2009 scientific determination that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare. That determination has been the legal foundation for nearly all federal actions to curb planet-warming emissions of carbon dioxide and methane, including the authority to regulate vehicle greenhouse gas emissions, one of the nation’s largest sources of climate pollution.
The Clean Air Act is clear: U.S. EPA has an affirmative duty to protect public health and welfare from air pollutants, including greenhouse gases, a responsibility the Supreme Court affirmed in 2007.
In September 2025, Gov. Newsom submitted a formal comment to the U.S. EPA opposing EPA’s proposal to reverse the Endangerment Finding. Watch his video comments and read his full letter.
The cost of Trump’s dereliction of duty will be measured in human lives and economic devastation. In California alone, wildfires fueled by rising temperatures have killed hundreds, destroyed entire communities and tens of thousands of homes, and caused tens of billions of dollars in damage.
“Air quality regulations help us breathe cleaner air, producing health benefits across California and the United States and decreasing air pollution-related heart and lung disease. Additional climate change health impacts include increased injury and loss of life due to wildfires and severe storms, increased occurrences of vector-borne and water-borne diseases, and stress and mental trauma from loss of livelihoods, property loss and displacement,” said Dr. Erica Pan, California Department of Public Health Director and State Public Health Officer. “Climate change also disproportionately harms the mental health and well-being of children and youth, with heat, extreme weather, poor air quality, displacement, and other impacts leading to anxiety, depression, sleep troubles, post-traumatic stress disorder, impairment to cognitive development and function, decreases in learning, and other mental health challenges that can have long-term consequences.”