Ex-Republican sounds alarm over Trump's under-the-radar 'power grab'

President Donald Trump has made numerous moves criticized as "power grabs" throughout his second term in the White House, but in a new piece for The Hill, a former Republican sounded the alarm about one that has potentially flown under the radar.

Christine Todd Whitman previously served as the first female governor of New Jersey from 1994 to 2001, before joining the administration of George W. Bush as head of the Environmental Protection Agency until 2003. As of 2022, however, she has departed the Republican Party to head up the Forward Party, an attempt to launch a centrist third party, alongside former Democratic candidate Andrew Yang.

On Sunday, Whitman published a new op-ed for The Hill in which she professed to be "extremely concerned" about Trump's efforts to manipulate the Coastal Zone Management Act in order "to impose a federal takeover of California’s coast." She praised the law, signed by Richard Nixon, for establishing a system of "state-federal partnership" in managing ocean and lake coastlines that helps states "advance their own priorities in federal decision making," rather than allowing decisions to be made via "presidential fiat."

"Under the guise of expanding offshore oil drilling and space launches, along with the establishment of seabed mining, this effort is supported by some of my Republican friends," Whitman wrote. "But political pendulums inevitably swing, and this short-sighted initiative creates a dangerous power grab for future presidents of any political stripe to exploit. It began when Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick ordered the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to reopen the routine evaluation of California’s coastal management program done, but not finalized, under the Biden administration. Lutnick’s order, citing economic factors and favoring select industries, signals this duplicative review is rigged."

Whitman added that "California has successfully worked alongside 10 presidents" in managing its coastlines under this law, and over the decades has "expanded access to its coast, preserved coastal parkland and wildlife, and ensured local governments have a voice in the approval of federal projects, including subsea fiber optic cables, offshore oil and gas production, and military training exercises." Under this newly ordered review, the state now stands to lose all of that progress.

"Over nearly 50 years, California has reviewed more than 3,700 federal actions impacting its coast and, in 96 percent of cases, either negotiated improvements or approved projects as submitted," Whitman explained. "Clearly, the state-federal partnership has worked.... This formula for success falls apart if Washington can supplant California’s priorities with its own, especially if the Trump administration’s rush for new offshore drilling results in oil spills. We’ve seen time and again that such spills close fisheries, beaches and harbors, and transform vibrant coastal communities into ghost towns overnight."

Whitman also noted that California's coastal management systems are widely regarded as the best in the nation. If Trump were to successfully wreck them, "then like dominos, other states will easily follow, destroying one of our best examples of federalist governance."

"This should alarm every American," Whitman concluded. "Our love of the ocean is universal, so the right to manage the coast should remain equal under the law for all coastal states. Instead we see the administration play favorites, demonstrated by the abandonment of its oil drilling plans off the Atlantic coast after significant opposition from the region’s Republican leaders. As the old saying goes, Washington doesn’t have a monopoly on wisdom. Hopefully, we won’t have to relearn this lesson the hard way."