Environmental activist and media personality Erin Brockovich is slamming former Vice President Joe Biden’s pick of former DuPont official Michael McCabe to be on a transition team at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Brockovich penned a commentary for the Guardian about Biden’s pick if he should become president, entitled “Dear Joe Biden: Are You Kidding Me?”
She wrote:
Michael McCabe, a former employee of Biden and a former deputy Environmental Protection Agency administrator, later jumped ship to work as a consultant on communication strategy for DuPont during a time when the chemical company was looking to fight regulations of their star chemical perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) also known as C8. The toxic manmade chemical is used in everything from waterproof clothes, stain-resistant textiles and food packaging to non-stick pans. The compound has been linked to lowered fertility, cancer and liver damage. The Guardian reported this week that Harvard school of public health professor Philippe Grandjean, who studies environmental health, warns that PFAS chemicals, of which PFOA is one, might reduce the efficacy of a Covid-19 [Chinese coronavirus] vaccine.
It should go without saying that someone who advised DuPont on how to avoid regulations is not someone we want advising this new administration.
McCabe started managing DuPont’s communications with the EPA about the toxic chemical in 2003, according to an article in the Intercept. This was the time in which DuPont faced a barrage of litigation after the company dumped 7,100 tons of PFOA-filled waste in West Virginia, which made its way into the drinking water of 100,000 people. Countless members of the community faced debilitating illnesses as a result. The legal battle with the company was turned into the film Dark Waters in 2019.
Brockovich claims that the EPA has not set any national drinking water limits for perfluorinated chemicals, including PFOA, and that “tens of thousands of community drinking water systems across the country have never even tested for these contaminants.”
Brockovich chided Biden about his vow to defer to science.
“This newly elected president says we need to listen to the science,” Brockovich wrote. “Are you really listening to the science or are you listening to an industry insider, who is controlling the message?”
Brockovich claims McCabe’s tenure with Dupont “inevitably contributed to staving off costly clean-up and additional regulation headaches for the company.”
Brockovich concludes that McCabe would amount to bringing “the fox back to the hen house.”
“I call on Joe to do the right thing,” Brockovich wrote.
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