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PRESENTED BY BUCKABEAR AND THE BEEF KIDS

Nothing fancy today, just some climate updates with some classic quotes from the worst FEMA Director until now, W’s Michael D. “Heckuva Job” Brown.

The awesome climate organizer Saul Levin is guest-starring in this evening’s Calls for Climate, organized by Lead Locally. This week, folks are calling in support of Lily Franklin for the Virginia House of Delegates.

On its long-predicted march to greenhouse desertification, California is burning—thousands of lightning strikes are sparking blazes, the historic Gold Rush town of Chinese Camp has burned to the ground, and southern California continues to wilt in sweltering heat. On the other coast, New Jersey’s Buckabear Wildfire continues to grow.

Trump’s firing of Federal Emergency and Management Agency employees in retribution for their warnings about FEMA’s parlous state on the twentieth anniversary of the Katrina mass-murder event “blatantly violate the federal laws protecting whistleblowers,” the Government Accountability Project writes in a new complaint. This morning, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee is marking up the FEMA Act of 2025 (H.R. 4669), a bipartisan effort to make FEMA a Cabinet-level agency, in rebuke of the Trump regime’s campaign to kill it. Andrew Rumbach is live-blogging the markup.

Trump has initiated a new technology development and transfer program for wind energy, David Fickling writes.

This morning, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) voted with Republicans on the Environment and Public Works Committee to advance the nomination of Katherine Scarlett to be chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Whitehouse praised Scarlett’s work to speed up permitting under the National Environmental Protection Act. As the acting CEQ chair, Scarlett has already issued NEPA guidance making clear that environmental justice and cumulative impacts don’t need to be considered. The nomination of neo-fascist oil lawyer Jeffery Hall to be Assistant Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance was postponed to a later date.

In the ensuing oversight hearing for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Whitehouse confirmed that there are still seven DOGE staffers at the NRC, including Adam Blake, who “advises” at NRC, DOE, and EPA. He does not have an NRC supervisor.

Yesterday, the Environmental Pollution Agency held a virtual public hearing on its delay of methane pollution rules. Julia Kane noted the carbon polluter front groups who testified in support of the delay: the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, American Petroleum Institute, American Exploration & Production Council, GPA Midstream Association, Interstate Natural Gas Association of America, and Western Energy Alliance.

Hearings on the Hill:

• 10 AM: Senate Environment and Public Works Committee
  Votes on Nominations of Jeffrey Hall to be EPA Assistant Administrator, Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, and Katherine Scarlett to be a member of the Council on Environmental Quality

• 10 AM: Senate Foreign Relations Committee
  Nominations of Mindy Hildebrand to be Ambassador to Costa Rica, Bill Brazi to be Ambassador to Tunisia, and Todd Wilcox, to be Assistant Secretary of State for Diplomatic Security

• 10 AM: House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee
  Markup of FEMA Act and Counter-UAS Authority Security, Safety, and Reauthorization Act

• 10:15 AM: Senate Environment and Public Works Committee
  Oversight of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

• 10:15 AM: House Natural Resources Committee
     Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee
  Pro-Mining Legislation

• 10:30 AM: House Appropriations Committee
  Full Committee Markup of Fiscal Year 2026 Financial Services and General Government Bill

• 2 PM: House Natural Resources Committee
     Water, Wildlife and Fisheries Subcommittee
  Water, Wildlife, and Fisheries legislation

Climate Action Today:

• 6 PM: Lead Locally
  Calls for Climate: Support Local Climate Justice Champion Lily Franklin

Thanks for subscribing and spreading the word. If you’ve got job listings, event listings, or other hot news, I want to hear it. Connect with me—@[email protected], @climatebrad on Threads, and @climatebrad.hillheat.com on BlueSky.