In what the White House called the “largest deregulatory action in American history,” President Donald Trump rescinded a 2009 Obama-era Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) determination known as the endangerment finding. Issued in December 2009, that scientific and legal conclusion underpinned the EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases — carbon dioxide, methane and other heat-trapping emissions — as threats to “public health and welfare of current and future generations.” The authority derived from the Supreme Court’s 2007 Massachusetts v. EPA decision, which empowered the agency to target such emissions.
Speaking at the White House, Trump called the endangerment finding a “giant scam” with “no basis in fact” or law and blamed it for harming the auto industry. He argued repealing it will lower car prices and give Americans “a better car… for a lot less money.” The administration says undoing the rule will expand access to affordable, reliable energy and save the country more than $1.3 trillion by removing regulatory requirements tied to vehicle emissions standards and related programs.
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has argued the Obama and Biden administrations “twisted the law, ignored precedent, and warped science” to justify greenhouse gas rules, saying such regulations threatened livelihoods and raised costs for businesses and consumers. The White House also framed the move as part of a broader pivot toward expanding fossil fuel production and easing environmental oversight.
Scientists and environmental experts strongly dispute the administration’s position. Nonprofit groups such as the American Geophysical Union say the endangerment finding is “grounded in decades of rigorous, peer-reviewed climate science.” Critics warn that rescinding it removes the EPA’s ability to use the 1963 Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gases, which could prevent the agency from enforcing limits on emissions from cars, trucks, power plants and the oil and gas industry.
Environmental analysts note the administration’s estimated savings do not account for the mounting costs of climate change — impacts on human health, biodiversity loss, and damages from extreme weather events like deadly heatwaves, floods and storms. Researchers and academics have warned that weakening US climate policy risks amplifying global warming’s consequences and could push Earth toward destabilized feedback loops with long-term, hard-to-reverse effects.
Specific consequences of eliminating the endangerment finding include slowing or blocking stricter vehicle emissions standards and federal support for electric vehicles (EVs). The Biden administration had set a nonbinding goal for EVs to make up at least 50% of new car sales by 2030; the repeal undercuts federal leverage to pursue such targets. Transportation is the largest source of US heat-trapping emissions, making auto and truck standards central to emissions-reduction strategies.
Environmental and public policy experts described the move as a retreat from renewable energy and energy efficiency toward expanded use of coal, oil and natural gas. Gretchen Goldman of the Union of Concerned Scientists called the action “unlawful” and “destructive,” accusing the administration of acting at the behest of polluters. Barry Rabe, a University of Michigan professor, said it represented “a complete US step away from renewable energy and energy efficiency.”
The rollback is the latest in a series of actions by the Trump administration since the president began his second term in January 2025: withdrawal from international climate commitments including the Paris Agreement, cuts to environmental protections, suppression of climate research, and measures favorable to the fossil fuel industry. Just this week the president directed US military bases and facilities to buy electricity from “beautiful clean coal,” criticizing the reliability of renewable energy.
Environmental groups including the Environmental Defense Fund and Earthjustice say they will challenge the repeal in court, potentially taking the case to the Supreme Court. Legal battles could take years; until resolved, the endangerment finding and the policies it enabled will no longer apply. Manish Bapna of the Natural Resources Defense Council warned that people nationwide will “pay the price” for what he called an illegal action that hands a “free pass to oil billionaires.”
Some power companies are concerned the rollback could instead expose them to a surge of “public nuisance” lawsuits alleging activities that unreasonably interfere with community health and safety. Legal scholars have suggested the administration’s overreach could prompt litigation that undermines its regulatory aims.
Scientists continue to emphasize the link between rising temperatures and worsening extreme weather, public health impacts and biodiversity loss. William Ripple, an ecology professor at Oregon State University, warned that moving away from stability in Earth’s climate system increases the risk of entering a “hothouse” trajectory.
This article was edited by Tamsin Walker and updated with reactions to the EPA decision on February 12, 2026.