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Trump is outlawing environmentalism like he did with DEI for coal production [1]

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Date: 2025-04-08

The title is not hyperbole.

I was going to do a title using the song, then thought it was too important and not be glib, like my first diary on the subject today.

The song "Workin' In A Coal Mine" originally by Lee Dorsey (YouTube). Repopularized by Devo (YouTube).

This should worry you if this is followed through. Trump's Executive Order today is called Reinvigorating America's Beautiful Clean Coal Industry and Amending Executive Order 14241. The Fact Sheet is called President Donald J. Trump Protects American Energy from State Overreach.

It's worse than his attack on DEI, if that's possible. From the fact sheet:

"The Attorney General will prioritize taking action against laws and policies purporting to address 'climate change' policies, or involving 'environmental, social, governance' initiatives, 'environmental justice', carbon or 'greenhouse gas emissions,' and funds to collect carbon penalties or carbon taxes."

Environmentalism just got outlawed. Talking about climate change had already been wiped from government websites, but now it's being outlawed. Lee Zeldin of the EPA is a co-conspirator in this crime.

Trump is going to tell California that they can't set pollution standards for internal combustion engine cars. No one creating greenhouse gases will ever be penalized. Laws that were put in place to do so will be repealed or ignored by federal edict.

It's against the law to even talk about the environment, pollution, climate change and justice.

"States like New York and Vermont have imposed retroactive 'climate change' extortion laws on energy producers for those producers' alleged contributions to greenhouse gas emissions, while California forces restrictive carbon caps that punish businesses."

Climate change extortion laws. Trump makes it up as he goes. Alleged contributions. Alleged, because Trump believes there is no climate crime. He doesn't believe in climate change.

"Affordable energy is essential for heating homes, fueling vehicles, and powering industries, all of which are jeopardized by ideologically-driven state laws."

Fueling vehicles. Electric cars need not apply. Every ideology except MAGA need not apply also.

"President Trump is committed to holding efforts by individual states to impose their regulatory preferences on the entire nation, defending federalism, and safeguarding Americans from overreaching, ideologically-driven state policies."

California. I told you it was coming. But that's just the start.

"His administration is working to block efforts by California to set its own vehicle emission standards that would have forced automakers across the country to comply with the state's extreme environmental rules."

I hadn't read this when I predicted it was going to be in the order somewhere. This is just the fact sheet. Shall we say there's something wrong about states' rights in this paragraph? If state rights don't make any difference anymore then we should go back to a Roe v. Wade standard for abortion everywhere.

There's not much more I really need to explain about the fact sheet. You've seen the relative important parts. So it's time to go to the executive order for detail.

The beginning of the order starts off with coal.

"Coal is abundant and cost-effective, and can be used in any weather condition."

So, instead of wind and solar, which does not work when it's dark, and don't do anything when there's no wind, we have to go back to pollution from coal. There's also nuclear power plants, including new, small, modular designs that have fail safe capabilities that shut down in emergencies automatically. There are also the natural gas fired power plants. You get the natural gas when you're drilling for oil, why not just use that gas for new power plants instead of coal-fired?

Here's his ridiculous justification for building the coal fired power plants.

"Our Nation's beautiful Clean Coal resources will be critical to meet the rise in electricity demand due to the resurgence of domestic manufacturing and the construction of artificial intelligence data processing centers."

He forgot about Bitcoin mining. In order to feed artificial intelligence, we need to pollute the air. When we die, the principle of artificial intelligence won't seem that great anymore. As far as domestic manufacturing is concerned, no one is going to have any money to do it with the tariffs that have been put in place.

"It is a national priority to support the domestic coal industry by removing Federal regulatory barriers that undermine coal production..."

A national priority. He might as well have said national security or a national emergency. He's used that for everything else. Why not now? Federal regulatory barriers. That means removing EPA standards and allowing as much pollution as they want to generate. No restrictions. No smoke stack scrubbers.

There's this part of the executive order of the definition of coal is being changed to mean it's a mineral. Here is the dovetail to executive order 14241, which was called "Immediate Measures to Increase American Mineral Production."

He commands the Secretary of Energy, Secretary of the Interior, and the Secretary of Agriculture to plow the road for coal mines to be opened on federal lands.

Then, Trump says that they can declare emergencies to get the coal mines created and producing.

He calls for the cancellation of the Jewell Moratorium imposed by Secretary of the Interior Jewell in 2016 that blocked the use of federal lands for coal mining.

Then he commands the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Lee Zeldin, the Secretary of Transportation Duffy, Secretary of the Interior Burgum, Secretary of Energy Wright, Secretary of Labor DeRemer, and the Secretary of the Treasury Bessent to ferret out anything that could possibly be used to prevent his desire for coal to take over the energy sector.

To make things run as smooth as possible for the expansion of coal mining, the Treasury it to make all available resources of loans, grants, whatever it takes, legal or not, to get these guys going.

But that wasn't enough. The International Development Finance Corporation, the Export-Import Bank of the United States and the heads of all agencies are to get to work right away and make this all possible.

Now all I need to do is give you the headings of sections that are self-explanatory.

Sec. 7 Supporting American Coal Exports.

Sec. 8 Expanding Use of Categorical Exclusions for Coal Under the Environmental Policy Act.

Sec. 9 Steel Dominance.

Sec. 10 Powering Artificial Intelligence Centers.

Sec. 11 Acceleration of Coal Technology.

This is all completely insane. Taking us backward a hundred years. There are many new technologies available to generate electricity, and more to come.

Outlawing environmentalism and the use of the words environmental and climate change tell you exactly where Trump is headed.

First, Trump decided to destroy our brains with his Ponzi-scheme like policies. Now he wants to take away our ability to be healthy for the sake of artificial intelligence.

I seem to be saying this about every single Trump diary I do now.

The man has to be stopped.

The Truth Social posts diary that came first.

Trump conned some guys who might be coal miners to clap.

Too many smiley faces for the death of America.

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