“Trump EPA is manipulating safety data around a highly toxic flame retardant, advocates allege”

What actually happened

EPA released a draft TSCA risk evaluation for TBBPA in June 2026 that found no unreasonable risk to consumers or children from the flame retardant, while public health advocates, state attorneys general, and a former EPA scientist argue the agency underestimated exposure and leaned on industry-funded studies to reach that conclusion. The chemical is classified by IARC as a probable human carcinogen, a finding EPA's draft did not adopt for the exposure levels it assessed.

Key facts

• EPA's draft risk evaluation, released for comment on June 12, 2026, found EPA found that the chemical poses "unreasonable risk to workers driven by inhalation exposure (three conditions of use) and unreasonable risk to the environment driven by to releases to surface water during certain processing and disposal activities (two conditions of uses)."
• Separately, EPA did not identify unreasonable risk to consumers, which may draw some criticisms from environmental and public health groups, confirming the central Guardian claim from a neutral industry-law source, not just advocates.
• California's Attorney General, joining a multistate coalition, states the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment has also listed TBBPA on California's Proposition 65 list of carcinogens because it is a probable human carcinogen, aligning with IARC's classification cited in the Guardian piece.
• The multistate coalition argues in issuing any future risk evaluation for TBBPA, EPA should revise the cancer hazard assessment to find that TBBPA is "Likely to Be Carcinogenic to Humans", independently mirroring Earthjustice's and Doa's criticisms in the article.
• The IARC classification predates this controversy: a 2017 Federal Register notice on an earlier TSCA petition notes The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has identified TBBPA as probably carcinogenic to humans.

What to watch for

• Watch whether EPA's final risk evaluation (post comment period, which closed August 17, 2026) changes the consumer finding after the multistate AG and Earthjustice comments, or whether it holds.
• Watch the composition and output of the Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals peer review, given the conflict-of-interest allegation around Dourson's dual role.
• Watch for whether outlets covering the final rule note the worker/environment "unreasonable risk" finding EPA did make, which the Guardian's framing underplays by focusing solely on the consumer conclusion.