Earthjustice Action Statement on House Passage of SPEED Act

WASHINGTON, DC—Today, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Standardizing Permitting and Expediting Economic Development (SPEED) Act. The bill would gut the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by limiting its scope and drastically limiting government accountability efforts when federal agencies fail to adequately consider the health, environmental, or economic impacts of decisions. After the bill’s passage, Earthjustice Action Senior Legislative Counsel Stephen Schima issued the following statement:  

“The SPEED Act fundamentally undermines a bedrock environmental law in favor of empowering a lawless Trump administration, handing it a powerful tool to quickly permit polluting projects without adequately analyzing and disclosing a project’s impacts on our safety, health, and communities. We urgently need to build the infrastructure necessary to address the climate crisis and to transition to a clean energy economy, but this bill is not the solution. Far from helping build the clean energy projects of the future, the SPEED Act will only result in an abundance of contaminated air and water, dirty projects, and chronic illnesses with fewer opportunities to hold polluters accountable in court.”