Houston — Donna Thomas is a pollution warrior in Houston, Texas. She wears a mask because she believes a lifetime of breathing polluted air in her community contributed to a stroke four years ago.

Near her home, Thomas points out Texas’ largest coal-fired power plant.

“It’s the oldest thing you can be burning in our neighborhoods. It’s dangerous,” Thomas said.

To respond to communities like hers, the Environmental Protection Agency under President Biden created a new Office of Environmental Justice. It is staffed by  200 people and funded by more than $2.8 billion that goes directly to “disadvantaged, marginalized, and over-polluted communities,” including support for projects that allow neighborhoods to monitor their own air quality.

But  Project 2025, a possible roadmap for President-Elect Donald Trump, recommends “eliminating the EPA’s stand-alone Office of Environmental Justice.”

“We already know that everybody’s concerned. We want our EPA to be stronger,” Thomas said.

But that is unlikely, as Trump has vowed to “cut ten old regulations for every one new regulation.”

Many business and industry leaders say environmental regulation is anti-competitive and costs them money. In his first term, Trump cut 100 environmental regulations. Just last week, he posted on social media that “any person or company investing one billion dollars… in the United States, will receive fully expedited approvals and permits, including…all environmental approvals.”

Daniel Cohan, a professor and researcher at Rice University, sits on one of the EPA’s scientific advisory boards and is skeptical of the claim that environmental regulations stifle business.

“We’ve seen the oil and gas industry prosper and produce more oil and gas than ever before, even with EPA regulations,” Cohan said.

Since the EPA first started regulating clean air in the 1970s, emissions of the most common air pollutants have dropped by almost 80%.  But around Houston, there’s still a long way to go. Each year, the pollution from that power plant is responsible for 177 premature deaths, a 2018 Rice University study found.

In a statement to CBS News, the plant owner, NRG, wrote: “…We have a strict policy of complying with all environmental rules and regulations and proud of our environmental record.”

Thomas believes that protecting the environment isn’t a partisan issue.

“Whether you’re a Democrat or Republican, you should be protected from all the environmental issues, but you’re not because there’s no justice out here for people,” Thomas said.

And she’s convinced over the next four years that environmental regulation and enforcement will be harder to come by. 

David Schechter

David Schechter is a national environmental correspondent and the host of “On the Dot with David Schechter,” a guided journey to explore how we’re changing the earth and earth is changing us.