IF YOU POISON THE WATER, THE BILL SHOULD HAVE YOUR NAME ON IT.

JUSTICE · ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

Published by Langhorne P. Breedlove

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2026 · 1:19 AM ET

Tags: Pollution · Environmental Enforcement · Corporate Accountability · Clean Water · Public Health

Dear fellow American proletariat: A business can earn money making something useful. It can also save money by sending the resulting waste downstream. The first activity is commerce. The second may be a violation of law, depending on what was released, the permit, and the circumstances. The river, regrettably, does not send invoices. Communities have been left to do that themselves.

American Proletariat proposes vigorous, lawful enforcement of pollution controls and a system in which responsible parties bear cleanup costs whenever legally appropriate. The objective is not to criminalize every accident, shut down every factory, or declare that an allegation is a conviction. It is to identify violations accurately, stop continuing harm, repair damage where possible, and ensure that penalties are more than a routine cost of business.

THE MANDATE

Strengthen inspection, sampling, reporting, civil enforcement, and properly supported criminal investigation across air, water, hazardous waste, toxic substances, and contaminated sites. Direct agencies to seek legally appropriate compliance orders, cleanup, penalties, restitution, and recovery of public response costs. Protect whistleblowers and nearby communities while guaranteeing notice, review, and due process for accused parties.

Separate three duties. Prevention requires enforceable limits and reliable monitoring. Accountability requires proof of a violation and proportionate remedies. Restoration requires identifying the harm, selecting an effective cleanup, paying for it, and verifying results. A fine without compliance may leave the pollution in place; cleanup without accountability may send the bill to taxpayers.

ROOTS & HISTORY

The modern federal framework emerged through several statutes rather than one grand proclamation. The Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act set regulatory and enforcement systems for specified air and water pollution. The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act governs important aspects of hazardous waste management. Congress enacted the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act in 1980, commonly called Superfund, to address releases of hazardous substances and allocate response costs. Different statutes have different triggers, defendants, defenses, and remedies. (Sources 01, 02)

Under CERCLA, certain current and former owners, operators, arrangers, and transporters may be liable for hazardous-substance response costs. Liability can be strict and, in appropriate circumstances, joint and several or retroactive. But statutory defenses, exemptions, allocation issues, and special rules for smaller contributors matter. The phrase ‘polluter pays’ is a policy principle with actual legal machinery—not a license to send a random neighboring business the full bill. (Sources 02, 03)

TODAY · BY THE NUMBERS

EPA reported that its fiscal year 2025 civil enforcement program concluded 2,127 cases, assessed more than $650 million in civil penalties, and obtained commitments exceeding $6.4 billion to bring facilities into compliance. The agency associated those cases with nearly 116 million pounds of pollution reduced, treated, or eliminated. These are agency-reported enforcement outputs for that fiscal year, not cash collected by Treasury or a count of all U.S. pollution. (Source 04)

EPA separately reported 187 new criminal cases opened and 156 defendants charged during fiscal 2025, with more than $600 million in fines, restitution, and court-ordered relief. A charge is not a conviction, and a court order is not necessarily an amount already paid. Reporting those distinctions is essential if public accountability is to mean more than an impressive number in a press release. (Source 05)

The Congressional Research Service explained in 2026 that environmental criminal liability depends on the elements of each offense and its required mental state. Some federal pollution statutes authorize criminal penalties for negligent conduct; others require knowing or willful violations. Civil enforcement and criminal prosecution operate under different procedures and standards of proof. A serious anti-pollution proposal cannot erase those differences because the word ‘punish’ sounds satisfying. (Source 06)

THE LEGAL PATH

Congress can amend environmental statutes, authorize monitoring and reporting, adjust penalties, and fund EPA and Department of Justice enforcement. EPA has existing administrative and civil authorities under applicable law; DOJ brings many federal judicial enforcement and criminal matters. States, Tribes, and territories also carry out important enforcement functions under their own laws and delegated programs. A president cannot create new federal crimes by press release, and agencies cannot punish conduct that the applicable law does not prohibit. (Sources 01, 06)

CERCLA already allows EPA to identify potentially responsible parties, negotiate settlements, issue certain orders, perform response work, and pursue cost recovery, subject to legal requirements. State and Tribal relationships, ownership histories, technical evidence, and defenses must be evaluated site by site. (Sources 02, 07)

THE PLAN

01 · FIND THE HARM BEFORE IT SPREADS

Prioritize inspections and monitoring based on risk, credible complaints, compliance history, pollution pathways, and exposure. Fund accredited laboratories, transparent sampling methods, and accessible reporting. Provide communities with intelligible test results, and protect confidential information only where a lawful basis exists.

02 · ENFORCE THE REQUIREMENT THAT WAS ACTUALLY BROKEN

Identify the permit, statute, regulation, or order governing each allegation. Document who controlled the activity, the release, dates, quantities, and evidence. Choose compliance assistance where appropriate for minor correctable violations; escalate to civil orders, substantial penalties, or criminal referral when the record and legal standards justify it. Repeat noncompliance should receive meaningful scrutiny.

03 · MAKE RESTORATION THE CENTRAL REMEDY

Require timely mitigation and technically sound cleanup when authorized. Connect contaminated-site discovery with remediation programs, public-health screening, natural-resource damage assessment, and long-term monitoring. A settlement announcing a magnificent fine does not purify a single glass of water unless the contamination is actually addressed.

04 · FOLLOW THE CORPORATE STRUCTURE WITHOUT INVENTING LIABILITY

Investigate relevant ownership, operating control, disposal arrangements, successor entities, insurance, and potential responsible-party relationships under the applicable statute. Prevent sham transfers from frustrating valid judgments while respecting corporate separateness, lawful defenses, and judicial review. Publicize substantiated enforcement outcomes rather than implying guilt from a corporate family tree.

05 · PROTECT COMMUNITIES AND WORKERS

Expand accessible complaint channels, anti-retaliation protections, language access, and timely public notices. Invite meaningful input from impacted residents and Tribal governments without implying that consultation alone replaces statutory jurisdiction or Tribal consent requirements. Provide clear opportunities to challenge agency decisions and the adequacy of cleanup plans.

06 · INDEPENDENTLY AUDIT RESULTS

Verify that ordered controls are installed, emissions or discharges decline, affected water and soil meet the relevant cleanup standards, and recovered funds go where law directs. Publish case status, laboratory methods, compliance deadlines, appeals, amounts assessed versus collected, and long-term monitoring results.

THE TEN-YEAR LEDGER

YEAR ONE · ESTIMATE PENDING. Start with enacted budgets and staffing for EPA civil and criminal enforcement, DOJ litigation, federal laboratories, contaminated-site response, and cooperating state and Tribal programs. Model the incremental costs of inspectors, investigators, sampling, forensic analysis, legal staff, community notification, data systems, and initial cleanup actions. Separate payments by liable parties from federal outlays and from penalties actually deposited into authorized accounts.

YEARS TWO THROUGH TEN · ESTIMATE PENDING. Forecast annual enforcement costs, compliance monitoring, site-specific remediation, litigation, appeals, expected collections, settlement performance, and long-term environmental testing. Distinguish gross cleanup commitments from direct government spending, and avoid treating a court-ordered private cleanup as new federal revenue. Publish low, central, and high scenarios, nominal and inflation-adjusted amounts, and the assumptions behind each.

For illustration, 200 additional field and laboratory positions at an assumed fully loaded $175,000 annually would represent $35 million per year before equipment, facilities, litigation, and remediation. That is an arithmetic scenario—not an adopted staffing plan, a verified average salary, or a forecast of savings. Any claimed benefits from avoided illness or restored ecosystems should be assessed transparently rather than booked as guaranteed Treasury receipts.

WHAT COULD GO WRONG?

Overbroad enforcement can penalize parties whose conduct did not violate applicable standards or whose legal liability differs materially from public assumptions. Poor sampling, inadequate chain of custody, rushed causation analysis, or political selection of defendants can undermine a valid case. Small operators may need clear compliance assistance, and cleanup technology can itself impose environmental or economic costs.

Conversely, penalties that are too small may fail to deter repeat violations, and a narrow focus on fines can neglect actual repair. The public also faces difficult tradeoffs when a major local employer is responsible for contamination: jobs, health, cleanup funding, and the legal rights of workers and neighbors all matter. A credible policy must handle those tradeoffs with evidence rather than pretending that every facility can be shut overnight without consequences.

MEASURING SUCCESS

Track independently verified releases and exposures, timely inspections, repeat violations, time to compliance, environmental concentrations before and after remedies, health-protection outcomes where evidence permits, cleanup milestones, assessed versus collected penalties, recoverable response costs, and the cost and duration of investigations. Publish results by geography and affected community with appropriate privacy safeguards, and distinguish allegations, charges, findings, and final judgments.

THE POINT

Pollution can impose costs on people who never agreed to bear them. Environmental law exists in part to establish responsibilities and remedies rather than leaving those costs invisible. A functioning enforcement system should make compliance predictable, identify wrongdoing accurately, restore damaged places when feasible, and protect the rights of everyone involved.

The principle is simple enough to fit on a bumper sticker; the implementation requires scientists, lawyers, inspectors, judges, engineers, and detailed budgets. If the public pays to clean up a legally responsible party's mess while that party walks away from enforceable obligations, there is an accountability problem worth fixing. The river is not a line item to be written off.

E pluribus unum, bitches.

SOURCES & FURTHER READING

01 · Environmental Protection Agency — Fact Sheet: EPA’s Civil Enforcement Program, updated June 2025. https://www.epa.gov/enforcement/fact-sheet-epas-civil-enforcement-program

02 · Environmental Protection Agency — Superfund Enforcement: CERCLA authorities and cleanup cost recovery. https://www.epa.gov/enforcement/superfund-enforcement

03 · Environmental Protection Agency — Superfund Liability, liable parties, defenses, and exemptions. https://www.epa.gov/enforcement/superfund-liability

04 · Environmental Protection Agency — FY 2025 Civil Enforcement Annual Results, published 2026. https://www.epa.gov/enforcement/enforcement-and-compliance-assurance-annual-results-fy-2025-civil-enforcement

05 · Environmental Protection Agency — FY 2025 Criminal Enforcement Annual Results, published 2026. https://www.epa.gov/enforcement/enforcement-and-compliance-assurance-annual-results-fy-2025-criminal-enforcement

06 · Congressional Research Service — Enforcement of Federal Pollution Control Laws (2026). https://www.everycrsreport.com/reports/R48926.html

07 · Environmental Protection Agency — Superfund Enforcement Authorities, CERCLA sections 104, 106, 107, 120 and 122. https://www.epa.gov/enforcement/superfund-enforcement-authorities

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WE ARE ONE.  ·  E PLURIBUS UNUM.