FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 28, 2025
CONTACT:
Aaron Bharucha, Public Relations Associate
(509) 429-1699 and epn-press@environmentalprotectionnetwork.org
EPN Condemns Trump Administration’s Attack on Labor Rights and Environmental Protections, Targeting Federal Workers with National Security Pretext
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Environmental Protection Network (EPN) strongly condemns the Trump administration’s latest directive, issued through the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), which excludes federal employees from labor-management forums under the pretext of national security. This action is a direct attack on the rights of public servants, such as the scientists, engineers, and environmental professionals of EPA, who are essential to protecting public health, safeguarding natural resources, and addressing the climate crisis.
More alarmingly, by stripping these employees of workplace protections, this move clears the way for mass firings of scientists and enforcement staff, which would allow corporate polluters to operate without accountability under the the Clean Air Act, Safe Drinking Water Act, and other critical environmental laws. By restricting their ability to participate in labor-management discussions, the administration is silencing critical expertise and weakening the federal government’s capacity to respond to environmental and public health threats.
“This directive is a dangerous and unjustified move that weakens the ability of federal employees to do their jobs effectively. Federal scientists and environmental professionals are on the front lines of protecting public health and addressing the climate crisis. Silencing them under the guise of national security is both misleading and reckless. Worker voices are essential to a functioning democracy and to sound, science-based policymaking. This attack on labor rights cannot go unchallenged,” said Michelle Roos, Executive Director of the Environmental Protection Network.
Labor-management collaboration is not a bureaucratic obstacle; it is an essential mechanism for ensuring effective, science-based policymaking. By dismantling these forums, the Trump administration is undermining transparency, eroding worker protections, and compromising the integrity of agencies like the EPA. This directive sets a dangerous precedent for sidelining expertise in favor of political agendas.
Furthermore, by targeting federal employee unions, this administration is signaling a broader effort to weaken organized labor across all sectors. If the government can justify silencing the voices of its own workforce under the guise of national security, it paves the way for similar actions against unions in the other sectors, including teachers, nurses, autoworkers, steelworkers, plumbers and others, undermining workers’ rights, wages, and workplace protections nationwide. This is not just a federal issue; it is a direct challenge to the labor movement as a whole.
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Founded in 2017, the Environmental Protection Network harnesses the expertise of more than 600 former EPA career staff and confirmation-level appointees from Democratic and Republican administrations to provide the unique perspective of former scientists and regulators with decades of historical and subject matter knowledge.