EPA Puts Good Science and Children’s Health on the Chopping Block

Shuttering the Office of Research and Development would set back years of progress and research essential to protecting Americans’ health 

By: Mayra Reiter, Senior Research and Policy Analyst, Earthjustice Action 

Even during the longest government shutdown in history, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin continued recklessly dismantling the Office of Research and Development (ORD). ORD has been responsible for some of the greatest advances in our understanding of the relationship between pollution and disease, especially the ways in which it affects children’s health and development. Its demise, and the purging of its staff of top-tier scientists, would be a devastating blow to this nation’s ability to protect the health of American families. 

To take ORD’s place, Zeldin is launching a much smaller Office of Applied Science and Environmental Solutions (OASES) within his own office. Unlike ORD, whose work includes long-term research that advances scientific knowledge of human health and the environment, the new office will be focused on the “immediate needs, goals, and requirements of EPA program and regional offices.” This narrower, short-term approach will neglect the five decades of fundamental research that ORD has so far carried out — research which has greatly advanced environmental health and saved millions of lives.   

Moreover, EPA has shared no information publicly about how it will fulfill its research duties without ORD, despite the critical role it plays in safeguarding our nation’s health. We need the rest of Congress to support public health and reverse this misguided “reorganization” before it’s too late. 

Unlike ORD, which has been separate from other EPA offices, the newly created OASES will be part of the Office of the Administrator. This setup will erode EPA scientists’ ability to do their jobs based on facts and evidence — not politics — and will make it easier for Zeldin to distort science at EPA in service of a particular agenda. Injecting political bias into what used to be a world-class research program will undermine the health protections EPA implements to safeguard Americans’ health. 

This is the latest effort to further anti-science actions at Zeldin’s EPA. 

Attacks on agency science are already happening. Political appointees recently ordered researchers in EPA’s Office of Water to stop publishing their research until it undergoes a new review process, despite the agency already having robust procedures in place to ensure the quality of published research. Administrator Zeldin is also trying to change the process by which EPA evaluates the safety of chemicals in favor of a less thorough one, a decision at odds with good science.  

As these episodes suggest, Zeldin’s alleged implementation of “gold standard science” is nothing more than smoke and mirrors to conceal the undermining of scientific research within the agency. This comes as no surprise, as Zeldin previously revoked EPA’s scientific integrity policy, which was designed to prevent political interference in employees’ work. He is making it harder for Americans to get nonpartisan EPA science they can trust. 

These attacks will have far-reaching consequences for public health. 

Earlier this year, Zeldin announced he would roll back over two dozen standards that protect the public from the harmful health effects of air pollution and drinking water contaminants. These standards also safeguard workers, first responders, and schoolchildren from industrial fires, explosions, and chemical leaks, among other hazards. This is just the beginning of what promises to be a sustained effort to attack the protections meant to ensure all Americans have clean air, safe drinking water, and a healthy environment.  

Losing ORD will devastate continued research into environmental factors that influence public health. 

ORD has made significant contributions to our understanding of the relationship between toxic chemicals like PFAS (“forever chemicals”) and disease, which is especially relevant for children’s health. ORD scientists have helped identify critical windows of development during which exposure to certain chemicals is more likely to cause neurodevelopmental and other health effects. Their modeling and analysis of children’s lead exposure have also helped guide policy decisions to better protect children from lead poisoning. Furthermore, ORD researchers have carried out crucial research into how exposure to endocrine disruptors during pregnancy affects fetal development and health outcomes, including cancer development, later in life. 

ORD has also played a key role in addressing environmental crises, such as PFAS pollution in the Cape Fear River in North Carolina. In 2017, North Carolina State University researchers discovered high levels of PFAS in the river’s watershed. ORD provided technical assistance to state and local authorities to address this contamination through monitoring, PFAS removal from drinking water, and remediation. By 2023, PFAS levels in the blood of local residents had decreased by up to 32%. 

The loss of scientific expertise and capacity at EPA will be devastating. ORD’s state-of-the-art research lab in North Carolina, which assessed air pollutants especially harmful to children’s health, was just shut down without any public input or transparency. ORD’s workforce was whittled down over a period of months before OASES was publicly launched. Some staff were pushed into resigning or retiring. Others were reassigned to different EPA offices. Many of these scientists were at the top of their fields, and their expertise cannot be easily replaced, especially as the so-called Department of Government Efficiency and this administration’s treatment of the civil service are likely to drive potential career staff away. Whereas ORD had about 1,500 staff prior to the cuts, OASES will be left with 542.  

The prospect of losing ORD is so alarming for public health that in the bipartisan report accompanying the fiscal year 2026 Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Appropriations Act (S.2431), the members of the Senate Committee on Appropriations declared themselves “appalled that the Agency has announced the imminent closure of ORD, which would result in the further loss of biologists, chemists, engineers, ecologists, and other expert scientists numbering in the thousands and the closure of world-class laboratories and research centers.” They directed EPA “to immediately halt all actions related to the closure, reduction, reorganization, or other similar such changes to ORD and the EPA scientific workforce.” The bill has not yet been enacted into law.  

Congress can act to secure ORD and the world-renowned research it delivers, and to protect Americans from this attack against science and public health. It can begin by adopting into the final government funding legislation the Senate Appropriations Committee language mandating that EPA preserve ORD and the key work it does. We also urge members of Congress to reject provisions in the House version of EPA appropriations that would slash the Agency’s science and technology funding. Finally, we need legislation that shores up ORD’s stability and long-term staffing, structure, facilities, and safeguards to ensure the public can continue to rely on ORD’s research and development. The health of our children and families depends on Congress acting now.