Months after a federal judge ordered the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate fluoride over risks to children’s brains, industry-backed lawmakers are pushing legislation that would weaken the nation’s primary law governing toxic chemicals.
The proposed changes would overhaul the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), a law first passed in 1976. Legal experts say the effort would block future citizen petitions, shield the EPA from court scrutiny, and dismantle the legal tools that made the fluoride case possible.
Citizen petitions allow the public to ask the EPA to regulate chemicals it has failed to address and to sue the agency if those petitions are denied. It was a citizen petition filed in 2016 that led to a landmark federal court ruling in September 2025, when a judge found that current levels of fluoride in drinking water pose an “unreasonable risk” to children’s health.
The judge ordered the EPA to take regulatory action. The agency is appealing the ruling.
Former EPA deputy administrator Robert Sussman said the proposed TSCA changes appear designed to prevent courts from intervening as they did in the fluoride case.
Hellbound and Down 