West Virginia Manufacturers Association (whose major member is Dow Chemical) wants to do something about the frequent "boil water" advisories in the state: specifically, they want to relax the criteria that results in water being declared unsafe to drink, on the ground that West Virginians are so overweight that they can absorb more dangerous substances before reaching unhealthy concentrations of them; and besides, West Virginians don't drink much water, anyway.
Chemical products are the leading industry in West Virginia (coal is a distant fourth). Trump carried West Virginia by 42 points, and immediately appointed Scott Pruitt (previously)-- a climate-denying, pollution-advocating criminal who advocated for lowering drinking water standards and was forced to resign after a series of corruption scandals -- to run the EPA.
Pruitt's replacement, Andrew Wheeler (previously) is a notorious white-supremacist who formerly served as a coal-industry lobbyist who previously advocated for lowering drinking water standards.a
The Trump administration's environmental record is a house of horrors, with EPA enforcements at a 30-year low.
In the aftermath of the 2016 election, Democrats were on the receiving end of countless lectures about how “liberal elites” looked down their noses at Trump voters. No state in the union represents Trump country more than West Virginia—where he won by 42 points.
I would suggest that the real “elites” who are looking down their noses at the Trump voters of West Virginia are those manufacturing companies producing chemical products that contaminate their water supply while telling them that, because they’re so fat and don’t drink enough water, they can handle being exposed to carcinogens. That also applies to any politician who does their bidding. If that makes me an elitist…so be it.
The Real Elitists Who Look Down on Trump Voters [Nancy LeTourneau/Washington Monthly]
