NEW JOINT REPORT: Trump’s Pro-Polluter Agenda is Making Americans Sicker While He Increases Health Care Costs 

Climate Power and Protect Our Care show how Trump is gutting pollution protections and leaving Americans to pay the price

Washington, DC – A new report from Protect Our Care and Climate Power outlines how Trump has gutted pollution protections, exposing American families to dangerous toxins that fuel asthma and other life-threatening illnesses at the same time that he is stripping them of their access to affordable, reliable health care. Republicans in Congress made $1 trillion in health care cuts, increasing health care costs while Americans reel from a Trump-created affordability crisis. 

On the campaign trail in 2024, Trump gathered his ultra-wealthy Big Oil donors for a closed-door meeting at Mar-a-Lago where he made them a deal: they donate a billion dollars to his campaign, he’d make it worth their while. This report shows how Trump has delivered for those donors and left everyday Americans to pay the price with more hospital visits, more sick days, and unaffordable health care. 

“Thanks to Donald Trump and Republicans, Americans aren’t just getting sicker — it’s getting more expensive and harder for Americans to get the care they need,” said Protect Our Care Chair Leslie Dach. “Trump and Republicans gutted more than $1 trillion from our health care system to give tax breaks to billionaires and big corporations, and now families are paying the price. For millions of people with asthma and other respiratory conditions, that means higher premiums and out-of-pocket costs, traveling farther to see a doctor, and tough choices about whether they can afford the care they need just to breathe. Dirtier air and a decimated health care system are a dangerous combination, leaving communities across the country more vulnerable and with nowhere to turn when they need help most.”

“Donald Trump and Republicans are pulling the rug out from under American families, making them sicker with their pro-pollution agenda and then leaving them to pay for the consequences out of their own pocket,” said Climate Power Senior Advisor Alex Witt. “Since day one, Trump has been a champion for oil and gas companies by giving them free rein to pump toxic chemicals into our air and water, exposing Americans to asthma, cancer, and other life-threatening illnesses. On top of that, he and Republicans made the largest cuts to health care in American history, just to pad the pockets of billionaires with massive tax cuts. Trump’s message couldn’t be more clear: Billionaires and corporations first, American families last.” 

The report’s findings include: 

• The scale of Trump’s pollution rollbacks is staggering. He gutted 31 pollution protections that, together, were set to deliver $275 billion in benefits per year and prevent 30,000 deaths annually. 
• Repealing just nine of those protections could result in 220,000 premature deaths, 300,000 emergency room visits, up to 42 million missed school and work days, and 117 million asthma cases by 2055. Eight of them alone could trigger more than 10,000 asthma attacks per day.
• None of this is hitting Americans equally. Asthma affects more than 3.6 million Latinos, who are twice as likely to visit an emergency room for asthma, and whose children are twice as likely to die from asthma compared to white children.
• The threat isn’t limited to the air. Trump has made it easier for companies to poison our water. He pushed to roll back protections on four types of PFAS—the “forever chemicals” linked to cancer, thyroid disease, and developmental harm—and withdrew the rule requiring PFAS manufacturers to monitor and reduce their pollution. At least 73 million Americans are served by water systems with at least one sample above the EPA’s PFAS threshold. 

Last year, Trump and Republicans in Congress cut over $1 trillion from Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act. The damage is now playing out in communities across the country. More than 15 million Americans are at risk of losing coverage.