← Videos · Energy & Permitting

Zeldin Testifies at the House Energy and Commerce FY2027 EPA Budget Hearing, Apr. 28, 2026

April 28, 2026 · PBS NewsHour · 2:45:56

Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube

What happened

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin testified on “The Fiscal Year 2027 Environmental Protection Agency Budget” before the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Environment on April 28, 2026, in PBS NewsHour’s live carry of the hearing. The chair laid out the request as $4.2 billion in new budget authority for the EPA — more than $2.5 billion for environmental programs, almost $750 million in grant assistance for states and tribes, more than $500 million for science and technology, and $290 million for Superfund cleanup — against the $100 billion the agency received for fiscal years 2022 through 2026 from the infrastructure and inflation laws, as the chair stated the figures.

Democratic members answered that the request cuts the EPA by more than 52 percent, including a 91 percent reduction to the categorical grants states rely on to implement environmental laws and a nearly 90 percent reduction — over $2.5 billion — to the state revolving funds, as the members stated them, calling the cooperative-federalism framing cost-shifting to the states. Zeldin’s opening statement closed with the case he carried through the FY2027 hearings: the proposal, as he put it, “captures significant efficiencies and a return focus on what Congress has directed us to do,” toward “a leaner, more efficient and accountable EPA.”

Why it matters

This is the authorizing committee’s full record on the FY2027 request, with both sides’ headline numbers on one transcript: the administration’s $4.2 billion leaner-EPA request and the minority’s 52 percent / 91 percent / 90 percent cut figures, each as its side stated them, for the scoreboard to track as the appropriations bills move.

Scoreboard watch

Scoreboard watch: the fiscal year 2027 EPA budget request as debated on April 28, 2026 — $4.2 billion in requested authority as the chair stated it, against the cut percentages the Democratic members stated. Flagged for the scoreboard editor; no entry is published from this page.

Sources: PBS NewsHour, “WATCH LIVE: EPA’s Zeldin testifies on Trump’s budget request before House Energy and Commerce panel” (Apr. 28, 2026, live carry, embedded above; remarks as delivered at the hearing).