Budget

EPA's annual appropriations funding sets the tone for the scope of the agency's agenda during each fiscal year. Our Budget section tracks the latest news on how the agency is implementing its existing dollars and how future budgets may affect its work.

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EPA's annual appropriations funding sets the tone for the scope of the agency's agenda during each fiscal year. Our Budget section tracks the latest news on how the agency is implementing its existing dollars and how future budgets may affect its work.

FY26 Budget Plan Seen ‘Fundamentally Altering’ EPA-State Relationships

State officials and other sources say EPA’s proposed fiscal year 2026 budget, which seeks to slash funding for state environmental and water infrastructure programs, highlights Trump administration plans to cut the federal environmental commitment, while profoundly changing the agency’s long-term partnership with states. EPA’s FY26 budget request “fundamentally reimagines the federal government's role in environmental policy and regulation,” say lawyers and advisors at Holland & Knight. Under the budget request, “nearly all categorical grants to states would be eliminated, and...

Thousands Of Employees Apply To Leave EPA Amid Morale Collapse

Over 16 percent of EPA employees have applied to leave the agency in the latest round of buyouts and early retirement offers, compounding already significant staff losses from past buyouts, reductions in force (RIFs) and probationary worker firings. As of May 30, EPA had received 2,629 applications for the second round of its buyouts -- the Deferred Resignation Program (DRP) -- and Voluntary Early Retirement Authority, an EPA spokesperson told Inside EPA . Those applications will still undergo a review...

Appeals Court Stays Funding Freeze Injunction, Backing DOJ Venue Claims

A divided federal appellate panel has stayed a key funding freeze injunction and backed Trump administration arguments that district courts lack jurisdiction over such claims, in a vindication of EPA and other agencies’ strategy to rely more on venue arguments as their merits defense of grant freezes and terminations has faltered. In a 2-1 decision, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit issued a June 5 order to stay pending appeal a South Carolina district...

EPA Plans Superfund Cuts, FTE Increases As Excise Taxes Again Fall Short

EPA is seeking to fully transition funding for the Superfund cleanup program to the chemical and oil industry taxes that Congress reauthorized during the Biden administration, resulting in massive cuts to the cleanup program as officials add additional funding burdens to the trust fund -- even as tax revenues again fall short of past projections. According to EPA’s just-released fiscal year 2026 Budget in Brief , the agency is seeking significant cuts to its Superfund remedial program given plans to...

New EPA Budget Documents Detail Massive Cuts To Staff, Enforcement

EPA’s detailed budget proposal for fiscal year 2026 aims to slash agency staff to the lowest level since 1985 while making drastic cuts to enforcement, Superfund and brownfields cleanups and funds for state-level infrastructure and environmental programs. The cuts, detailed in a White House technical document and an EPA budget in brief released May 30, would reduce EPA’s total budget by around 54 percent -- cutting it from $9.14 billion in FY25 to $4.16 billion in FY26. As part of...

OMB Technical Document

EPA Budget In Brief


Former Administrator Reilly Warns ‘Not To Normalize’ Trump EPA Actions

Former EPA Administrator William Reilly is warning of dire threats to the nation’s environmental protections posed by the second Trump administration while also holding out hope that EPA will ultimately prevail in executing its strict statutory missions. “My sense is that we need to be very careful not to normalize the behaviors we’re seeing” under President Donald Trump and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, says Reilly, who ran the agency from 1989 until 1993 and implemented major Clean Air Act amendments...

FOIA data shows EPA staff levels declined nearly 10 percent

A Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request by the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) has revealed that EPA staffing levels have declined nearly 10 percent from 2024 levels due to the Trump administration’s attacks on the agency’s career workforce. EPA staff records show that as of late April, EPA had lost 1,560 positions since 2024, when it had 17,700 employees, CBD said in a May 30 press release . “The EPA can’t protect American health while losing 10% of its...

Seeking To Reinstate Funding Freeze, DOJ Charges Injunction Overly Broad

The Justice Department (DOJ) is urging a federal appellate court to lift an injunction blocking the Trump administration from freezing a range of EPA’s climate and environmental justice grants, arguing the lower court block is overly broad and violates the executive branch’s authority to withhold funds in certain cases. The injunction is an “intolerable intrusion on the prerogatives of the Executive Branch” which “undermines the President’s unquestioned Article II authority to direct subordinate agencies how to exercise their own authorities,”...

Industry Eyes Senate To Kill Superfund Chemical Tax After House Loss

A chemical industry group is pledging to work with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and other senators in an effort to repeal the Superfund excise tax on chemicals in budget reconciliation legislation, after House lawmakers approved the legislation last week without such provisions. But the effort may face a high bar as any repeal of the taxes would likely have to offset any lost revenue to ensure it remains budget neutral -- or face a 60-vote threshold under Senate budget rules...

Zeldin’s Reorganization Plan Risks ‘Generation Of Scientists,’ Some Say

EPA is poised to lose “an entire generation” of scientists and engineers, current and former staffers say in response to sweeping changes Administrator Lee Zeldin is making that include the expected closure of the Office of Research & Development (ORD) and reorganization of other offices, threatening morale, scientific integrity and institutional memory. “We’re not just losing staff -- we’re losing an entire generation of scientists and engineers. Without them, we jeopardize scientific integrity and the very foundation of environmental protection...

EPA Funding Freeze Defense Falters, Forcing Increased Reliance On Venue

EPA’s central defense of its sweeping grant freezes and terminations is increasingly collapsing under scrutiny in federal courts, forcing officials to rely on claims that trial courts lack jurisdiction because such suits belong in federal claims courts, which hear contract disputes. As litigation over the Trump administration’s funding freezes has played out, EPA and other agencies have argued that their individual grant reviews show that the Biden-era grants are no longer in line with agency priorities or fail to prioritize...

Judge Continues To Block RIFs, Restructuring, Citing Congress’ Mandates

A federal judge has extended a block on the Trump administration’s sweeping reorganization and downsizing at EPA and other federal agencies, ruling for a second time that the president lacks authority to dramatically overhaul agencies enshrined in statute without Congress’ consent -- though the Justice Department (DOJ) has quickly appealed the ruling. Judge Susan Illston in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California issued a May 22 preliminary injunction blocking the administration’s efforts, just hours after a...

Judge Poised To Halt RIFs, Reorganization Amid White House-EPA Clash

A federal judge is poised to issue a preliminary injunction further barring the reorganization and downsizing of EPA and other agencies, as emerging details suggest that EPA leadership may have clashed over the size of personnel cuts with White House officials who were pushing for large-scale firings. Judge Susan Illston said at the start of a May 22 hearing that President Donald Trump’s executive order (EO) for restructuring and staff cuts, as well as agency plans to implement the EO,...

Capito Doubts Zeldin’s Defense For Planned FY26 Cuts To SRF Programs

Senate environment committee Chairman Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) is doubting EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin’s claims that the Trump administration is seeking to slash funding for the agency’s clean and drinking water state revolving fund (SRF) programs in fiscal year 2026 due to lawmakers’ earmarking of such funds for local projects. During a May 21 hearing on EPA’s FY26 budget request before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW), Capito, who also serves on the Senate Appropriations Committee, charged that...

Newsom’s Cap & Trade Budget Cuts Spark Lawmaker Queries, Unease

California lawmakers are questioning Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) revised fiscal year 2025-26 budget proposal seeking $1 billion for high-speed rail and $1.5 billion for firefighting from revenue generated by the state’s greenhouse gas cap-and-trade program, in part because it appears to scuttle previous plans to spend the other $2 billion in the fund. “I’m concerned that you’re proposing to cut over $1 billion from transit agencies that are struggling, from money that was already committed to them. Right? They’ve made...

Former Trump Official Says New EPA Goal To Claw Back Biden ‘Overreach’

A former top EPA official who served during President Donald Trump’s first term says the end goal for the agency in Trump’s second term is to claw back Biden-era regulatory overreach, particularly under the Clean Air Act, while noting EPA must nevertheless comply with what the official calls an outdated law. “The last major amendment was 35 years ago,” the source says, citing the 1990 air act amendments. Since then, “there have been a ton of developments. Pollution is going...

As Deadline Looms, DOJ Asks Justices To Allow EPA RIFs, Reorganization

The Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court to swiftly weigh in on its authority to reorganize and downsize EPA and other federal agencies ahead of a series of critical lower-court deadlines, seeking to skip over a pending review of the case in an appellate court. The Justice Department (DOJ) on May 16 filed an application for a stay of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California’s temporary restraining order (TRO), which blocked sweeping reorganizations and firings...

Alumni Warn Budget, Staff Cuts Threaten EPA’s Ability To Protect Public

A group representing almost 3000 former EPA staff is warning Congress and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin that efforts to slash the agency’s staff, budget and regulations will make it impossible for the federal government to adequately protect public health, as Congress gears up to consider fiscal year 2026 funding for the agency. The warnings, in a May 19 open letter from the EPA Alumni Association, also underscore ongoing concerns about a brain drain from EPA and other agencies, amid months...

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