Congressman Joe Kennedy III urged Congressional leadership to protect environmental justice communities before bailing out oil and gas corporations. An April 11, 2020 press release from his office says, “Following reports that air pollution increases the lethality of COVID-19, Congressman Joe Kennedy III today called on Congressional leadership to provide critical funding for environmental justice communities across the country before bailing out corporate oil and gas interests. As it becomes increasingly clear that health inequities and systemic racism make COVID-19 deadlier for communities of color and other frontline areas, Kennedy raised concerns that the Trump Administration has been more focused on keeping fossil fuels afloat rather than protecting vulnerable patients, workers, families, and communities.”

He asks that an additional COVID-19 emergency response package include “robust funding for environmental justice communities — forced to bear the brunt of this crisis already — and a firm rejection of oil and gas corporate bailouts.”

Kennedy recently introduced the Environmental Justice for All Act (with Congressman Raul Grijalva and Congressman Donald McEachin) and in February introduced the Voices for Environmental Justice Act.

Read the full press release here.