The Advocacy Campaign to Ban Chlorpyrifos: Pesticide Reform Under the Trump Administration

Abstract

Abstract

The success of environmental justice (EJ) struggles is dependent on community-based action. However, grassroots environmentalism is most successful when groups act during periods of increased political opportunity. Considering President Trump's promise to roll back environmental protections, tolerance of racism, and anti-immigrant stance, EJ scholars and advocates question how local communities can promote EJ under the Trump administration. This article explores the advocacy campaign to ban chlorpyrifos, a hazardous insecticide, and traces the administration's impact on advocates' tactics and outcomes. Advocates frame efforts to ban chlorpyrifos as an EJ struggle because exposure risk disproportionately impacts children and Latinx, immigrant farmworker communities. During the Obama administration, in response to advocacy groups' petition to ban chlorpyrifos use, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed to revoke all food tolerances and to cancel all registrations for chlorpyrifos. However, this proposed ruling was reversed after President Trump took office and nominated Scott Pruitt, an opponent of environmental regulations, as Administrator of the EPA. Furthermore, the EPA appealed the ensuing court decision ordering the agency to revoke all tolerances for chlorpyrifos. Nonetheless, advocates successfully pressured California and Hawaii to strengthen chlorpyrifos regulation. While changes to environmental policymaking under the Trump administration constrained the campaign's success at the federal level, opportunities for restricting chlorpyrifos expanded at the state level.