Fred Upton (R-MI) is leading the charge against EPA's public health protections.

Only three days after Republicans took over the House of Representatives, Americans are at risk of losing critical, life-saving pollution protections. Since they took their seats in the 112th Congress, some elected representatives have made shooting down or slowing down these protective pollution controls their top priority.

Today, House Republicans announced a resolution that seeks to undo U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rules to control toxic emissions from cement plants. EPA scientists have estimated the rules would prevent up to 2,500 premature deaths and thousands of heart and respiratory incidents, and save billions of dollars in health costs each year. Read more about this deadly proposal in Congress.

Also today, Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) and Rep. Ted Poe (R-TX) introduced two separate bills to delay and block EPA action on global warming pollution, scientifically found to endanger human health and welfare.

And, yesterday, a group of House members, all Republicans with one exception, introduced a bill that also would block the EPA from being able to follow through on its global warming pollution controls, which were required by the Supreme Court in 2007.

It's shocking and bewildering to see members of Congress take their seats and immediately come out swinging at pollution protections that SAVE OUR LIVES and keep us safe and healthy.

Photo: BLM

What do Dasher, Dancer, Prancer and Vixen, turtle doves, geese a-laying, calling birds, partridges in pear trees, and holly trees all have in common? They all make their home in the forest, of course.

This holiday season a coalition of environmental groups including Earthjustice is asking President Obama to give America a gift that stands the test of time: a forestry plan that safeguards our nation's woodlands for the future and protects forest creatures great and small. Join us by sending President Obama this holiday wish for our forests!

As we venture over the river and through the woods this holiday season—or along I-90, I-70, I-95, I-5, and other crowded highways we must travel—many of us will pass by some of the 200 million acres of magnificent forests that constitute our National Forest system.

This afternoon. the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals swatted down big polluters' attempts to block this nation's most important progress on cutting climate change pollution. This court decision is a huge victory for clean air in America and for progress on climate change.

A coalition of Texas polluters are responsible, yet again, for this unsuccessful effort to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from curbing global warming pollution from moving vehicles and the biggest industry polluters.

Earthjustice and others represented Environmental Defense Fund as a court intervenor in opposing the polluters' motions for a court stay on the endangerment finding and the EPA's action on carbon pollution, which has been scientifically found to harm and endanger human health and welfare.

Reacting to today's court decision,Earthjustice attorney David Baron said:

Must destroy genetically engineered crops. Grrrr...

Plain and simple: people do not want Dr. Frankenstein getting into the business of agriculture. Sure, the good doctor built one fine specimen of a monster, but when it comes to sugar beets and potatoes it seems most folks would rather stick with nature and forgo the jigsaw-puzzled gene mash of genetically engineered crops.

This week, the European Union’s European Commission was presented with a petition bearing the signatures of more than 1 million citizens asking that the commission stop approving genetically engineered crops, and convene a scientific body to study the modified organisms and implement regulations.

The petition will put the “European citizens' initiative” to the test, a new rule in the EU’s constitutional treaty allowing 1 million or more citizens to request a legislative redress. The petition comes in response to the EU’s March 2010 approval of cultivation of the Amflora potato produced by BASF Plant Sciences. The Amflora potato exclusively produces a waxy starch utilized in industrial applications, although the New York Times reports that the potato’s pulp may also be used as an animal feed.

The petition follows on the heels of a major legal victory last week when a federal judge sided with Earthjustice attorney Paul Achitoff and ordered genetically engineered sugar beets, which had already been planted, to be destroyed.