Mr. Pruitt may be using his position as an environmental deregulation czar to position himself to run for office in Oklahoma — or perhaps the presidency.
A generation after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, survivors and experts warn that sweeping cuts to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) under President Trump could leave the U.S. dangerously unprepared for future climate-driven disasters.
FEMA has laid off about one-third of its workforce under Trump and slashed funding for disaster preparedness and recovery, including grants aimed at vulnerable communities.
The president has signaled a shift to “state-led” disaster response, but former officials say states have always led — with federal backup — and many lack the resources to manage growing climate threats.
Trump’s appointee to lead FEMA has no prior disaster management experience, violating post-Katrina reform law and drawing sharp criticism from emergency management professionals.
Key quote:
“It has been so demoralizing to realize how closely aligned we have become again to what Fema looked like pre-Katrina, and how quickly we’ve backslid on the progress of the last 20 years.”
— Samantha Montano, disaster response expert at Massachusetts Maritime Academy
Why this matters:
After Hurricane Katrina exposed deep gaps in disaster readiness, Congress passed reforms to ensure the agency could respond more quickly and equitably. Those hard-earned changes are now unraveling. Layoffs, funding cuts, and politically driven leadership appointments are degrading FEMA’s capacity just as extreme weather becomes more frequent and more destructive. Poorer communities like New Orleans’s Lower Ninth Ward, which still bears Katrina’s scars, are at the greatest risk. Without strong federal support, states with limited budgets and infrastructure will struggle to respond, leaving vulnerable residents to fend for themselves when the next storm hits.
Two decades after Hurricane Katrina, adults who experienced the storm as children continue to struggle with emotional scars and a fractured sense of home, as climate threats to New Orleans persist.
When Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans in 2005, over 370,000 school-age children were displaced, thousands were reported missing, and many lost parents, homes, and community connections.
Survivors like E’jaaz Mason and Arnold Burks, both 13 at the time, recount trauma that went unspoken for years; a Harvard study found one in six affected children developed lasting mental health issues.
Despite post-Katrina infrastructure improvements, Louisiana’s coast continues to erode rapidly, and climate change is increasing hurricane risks while cuts to federal disaster agencies may leave future generations more vulnerable.
Key quote:
"Imagine someone just taking your brain and taking everything you know, shaking up your head, shaking up your memory, shaking everything, and then ripping it away. And putting it back after it was destroyed."
— Eric Griggs, vice president of Access Health Louisiana
Why this matters:
Disasters can permanently affect the minds and health of those who survive them, especially children. Hurricane Katrina offers a stark example of how trauma and displacement ripple through generations, particularly in under-resourced Black communities that bore the brunt of the storm. In the years since, rising sea levels and increasingly violent storms have placed New Orleans and other Gulf Coast cities in the path of repeated disasters, while ongoing erosion strips Louisiana of vital wetlands that once buffered storm surges. Cuts to emergency response infrastructure and weather forecasting agencies further heighten risk, raising concerns that the failures of 2005 could repeat. The children of Katrina are now adults, and their stories raise hard questions about what, if anything, has changed.
As extreme weather and climate-driven disasters intensify, many local officials fail to send lifesaving warnings through a federal emergency alert system designed to quickly reach people in harm’s way.
The federal Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS) can send urgent alerts to cellphones and media, but many communities don't use it due to high software costs, inadequate training, or fear of backlash from false alarms.
Since 2016, at least 15 federally declared disasters saw failures to send timely IPAWS alerts, with some alerts arriving only after catastrophic flooding, fires, or mudslides had already begun.
In recent tragedies, including the July 4 floods in Kerr County, Texas, local leaders either slept through the event or opted to use less-effective systems, resulting in over 100 deaths, many of them children.
Key quote:
“The most common mode of warning system failure is failure to initiate warnings in the first place.”
— Art Botterell, former senior emergency services coordinator, California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services
Why this matters:
In an age of intensifying climate disasters, fast, clear communication can mean the difference between life and death. Yet across the U.S., particularly in rural or underfunded regions, many emergency managers remain unprepared or hesitant to use IPAWS, the government’s most powerful public alert tool. Technical issues, budget constraints, and a lack of training often prevent its deployment when it’s needed most. Without federal requirements or standards for using the system, alerting remains inconsistent and fragmented — leaving communities vulnerable during floods, wildfires, and storms. As disasters increase, so does the human toll from these missed warnings, particularly in areas where families may be asleep, out of cell range, or unaware that danger is coming.
Democrats are blaming Republican-backed rollbacks of clean energy programs for rising electricity costs as they craft a midterm campaign strategy around energy prices.
Democratic lawmakers and aligned advocacy groups are accusing President Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” of gutting renewable energy incentives and driving up electricity prices for American households.
Messaging efforts emphasize that clean energy is not only environmentally beneficial but also cheaper and faster to deploy, a message Democrats hope will resonate in the 2026 midterms, especially with swing voters.
Energy prices have climbed faster than inflation, with Democrats citing utility data and industry studies to argue that states with more renewables have fared better than those that rely heavily on fossil fuels.
Key quote:
“The big ugly bill is going to mean a lot of big ugly energy bills arriving in the mail for Americans around the country.”
— Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.)
Why this matters:
Electricity prices are becoming a political flashpoint, but beyond partisanship, the debate reveals deeper questions about the U.S. energy system. Wind and solar have become the cheapest sources of new electricity in much of the country, yet the cost of building new infrastructure and managing power demand is rising. As the U.S. adds data centers and electrifies more sectors, demand for power is growing fast, and fossil fuel reliance can lock in price volatility. Renewable energy often delivers price stability, but its association with climate politics has made it a harder sell in some districts. Meanwhile, consumers are left paying higher utility bills, with the reasons why often obscured by misinformation and partisan spin.
Oil and gas companies have lobbied Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government to roll back key Trudeau-era climate policies ahead of an expected update to Canada’s Emissions Reduction Plan.
In meetings and lobbying disclosures from May and June, oil and gas firms targeted regulations on clean fuels, electricity, methane, carbon pricing, and the proposed emissions cap, all core elements of Canada’s 2022 climate plan.
Companies including Enbridge, Suncor, Shell, and Imperial Oil lobbied Carney’s ministers, often citing competitiveness and U.S. tariffs under President Trump’s administration as reasons to weaken federal climate regulations.
The Carney government says it will update the climate plan by year’s end, citing economic changes and global pressures, but has not detailed which policies might be changed or retained.
Key quote:
“These are long-standing demands from these various industries: ‘Get rid of these things, we don’t want to be a part of this.’”
— Alex Cool-Fergus, national policy manager at Climate Action Network Canada
Why this matters:
Canada’s oil and gas sector is its largest source of industrial emissions, and lobbying efforts to dismantle or delay climate rules come as the country grapples with worsening climate impacts. Canada is warming at twice the global average — faster in its North — and 2024’s extreme heat and wildfire seasons bore the mark of human-driven climate change, according to government scientists. The 2022 climate plan aimed to cut emissions and reach net-zero by 2050, but ongoing pressure from the fossil fuel industry threatens to derail or dilute those commitments.
The Trump administration’s 50% tariff on Indian imports has sharply reduced the U.S. market for Indian solar panels, threatening the growth of India's expanding clean energy manufacturing sector.
India recently announced it had increased solar manufacturing capacity 50-fold over the past decade, producing enough panels to generate 100 gigawatts of electricity.
The U.S., previously India's largest buyer of solar panels, imposed a 50% tariff on Indian goods this week, making those exports financially unviable.
India now faces uncertainty over whether its domestic market can absorb the surplus, as it tries to scale up rooftop solar and reduce dependence on Chinese components.
Why this matters:
India is betting heavily on solar power to meet its energy needs while reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but its reliance on global trade leaves it vulnerable to shifting geopolitics. As it tries to compete with China in clean energy manufacturing, protectionist policies like U.S. tariffs threaten to stall momentum. The sudden loss of the American market may push Indian solar firms to slash production or abandon expansion plans. And because most Indian solar panel makers still depend on imports from China for key parts like silicon wafers, the country's push for energy independence remains precarious.
A national conservative group backed by oil money is spending heavily to weaken Vermont’s climate policies, challenging the state’s efforts to curb fossil fuel use.
Americans for Prosperity, funded by the Koch family, is pushing to overturn Vermont’s climate laws through digital campaigns, mailers, and public events, targeting measures like the Affordable Heat Act and the Global Warming Solutions Act.
The group’s New England director, Ross Connolly, said their mission is to counter “radical” progressive policies and promote deregulation, despite none of the group's key organizers living in Vermont.
Vermont has become a strategic testing ground for this approach, with Americans for Prosperity expanding its influence through local lobbying efforts and events while also settling a $3,000 fine for a campaign finance violation.
Key quote:
“The goal of the Affordable Heat Act is to help insulate Vermonters from fossil-fuel price swings, and to make it easier and more affordable for them to transition – if they want to – to more sustainable energy sources.”
— Jill Krowinski, Vermont House Speaker
Why this matters:
Vermont is on the front lines of a broader national strategy by fossil fuel interests to derail state-level climate action. The state's efforts to shift away from heating oil and toward electric heat pumps reflect a larger movement to cut carbon emissions from residential energy use. But this transition threatens the profits of entrenched oil interests, which are now using dark money groups to fight back. Americans for Prosperity, created and funded by Koch Industries, has long played a leading role in denying climate science and obstructing environmental regulation. Its entry into Vermont politics signals an intensification of these tactics in even the most progressive states.
