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On April 8, the Trump administration issued the “Protecting American Energy From State Overreach” executive order (EO), another in a blitz of orders and declarations focused on the energy sector. As with the other energy-related EOs, it contains numerous references to advancing so-called “energy dominance” — which is largely and ideologically focused on fossil fuel industries — despite the United States already being “dominant” in this sector.

In the midst of countless federal deregulatory actions, it’s easy to lose track of what’s happening to undermine states’ climate regulations and laws. Here in North Carolina, we are facing the cascading consequences of federal deregulation layered on top of threats to our state’s carbon plan law.

On April 8, flanked by a few coal miners in hard hats, President Donald Trump signed four executive orders to restore their industry to its past glory. Given that coal is now the most expensive way to generate power other than nuclear, that’s going to be a heavy lift. Like many of Trump’s orders, these four are full of threats and bluster but will have little immediate effect.

Since our last update (March 31), we have seen some movement regarding CRA resolutions. There have been no new resolutions signed into law (only two so far), but two more resolutions have cleared both chambers, so we can expect a signature from the president soon.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) efforts to regulate carbon emissions from power plants have had a tortuous history, and we’re about to go through another round, with a rule from a Democratic administration being repealed and replaced by a Trump rule. The last time this happened, the Trump EPA said that its interpretation of the statute required an extraordinarily narrow substitute rule. Because of intervening legal changes, it won’t find it as easy to make that argument this time. In the end, the Trump substitute rule will undoubtedly be weak but not as weak as last time.

It is no coincidence that since taking office on Martin Luther King Day, the Trump administration’s most aggressive actions have targeted historically marginalized groups. In fact, the many blatantly illegal, unconstitutional, and bizarre actions we saw during the first month of Trump 2.0 — during which we also observed National Black History Month — are specifically harmful to Black Americans.

President Donald Trump seeks to halt Congress’ support for tax credits, grants, and loans that are supporting a transition to clean transportation, a transition necessary to achieving public health standards and reducing the transportation sector’s substantial contribution to increasingly catastrophic climate change. It will be up to Congress to stand up to the president’s pressure and preserve its support for critical environmental and economic investments.

As described in Part I, President Trump’s attack on clean vehicles, introduced in his executive order on “Unleashing American Energy,” will undermine progress in achieving healthy air and reducing climate emissions. The executive order requires the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Transportation (DOT) to consider regulatory changes to vehicle emission standards that would eliminate what he calls the “EV mandate.”

President Donald Trump’s attack on electric vehicles threatens not only the nation’s progress in fighting climate change, but torpedoes our ability to achieve healthy air. The Inauguration Day executive order on “Unleashing American Energy” calls for eliminating the “electric vehicle (EV) mandate” and “unfair subsidies and other ill-conceived government distortions that favor EVs ….” Slowing our transition to clean vehicles will have the worst consequences for vulnerable frontline communities living near highways, ports, and warehouses, communities that already experience a disproportionate share of environmental harms.