Ferguson Files Suit Over Popular Insecticide

Last week, Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson joined several other states looking to ban the nation’s most widely used insecticide.  Ferguson, and attorneys general from four East Coast states and the District of Columbia filed the suit Wednesday.  In March the EPA rejected a petition filed a decade ago by the Pesticide Action Network of North America to declare any reside of chlorpyrifos on food unsafe…which would outlaw the use of the popular insecticide on commercial crops.  Environmental and labor groups have asked the 9^th Circuit Court to overrule the EPA, and ban the pesticide a safe amount of exposure is determined.

The EPA is still review this current suit.  Washington, Massachusetts, New York, Maryland, Vermont and DC filed to interview in the suit as the guardians of millions of Americans who are potentially exposed to unsafe levels of chlorpyrifos.

This is the fourth lawsuit Ferguson has filed against the Trump administration in less than six months.

“President Trump’s EPA is willfully ignoring scientific evidence that chlorpyrifos is harmful to human health,” Ferguson said. “Washington consumers, farmworkers and farm operators deserve an administration that respects science and cares about the risks to their health.”

If you have a story idea for the Washington Ag Network, call (509) 547-1618, or e-mail gvaagen@cherrycreekradio.com