President Trump’s Department of Justice has ordered federal prosecutors to stop pursuing criminal charges and drop all pending cases that target the sale of illicit “defeat devices” that tamper with the air pollution control systems in diesel-powered vehicles. Pretty much, what this means is rolling coal is now legal to do because we live in a hell run by 12-year-olds.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s edict is the first time that the DOJ has formally taken steps to scale back environmental criminal enforcement since Trump first took office a bit over a year ago. In a memo reviewed by the media, Blanche wrote that he made this decision “to ensure consistent and fair prosecution under the law, as well as to ensure the best use of Department resources.” Yeah, bud. I’m sure. From CBS News:
Although the Trump administration took drastic steps throughout 2025 to roll back environmental rules targeting greenhouse gas emissions, many of those actions focused on regulations or civil enforcement, as opposed to criminal environmental enforcement.
In justifying the decision, Blanche cited a new and untested legal theory that runs counter to conclusions reached by both career federal prosecutors and attorneys for the Environmental Protection Agency, according to internal government records reviewed by CBS and multiple sources familiar with the matter.
The theory posits that the violations could not be prosecuted as crimes under the Clean Air Act, and could only be pursued as civil offenses.
A Justice Department spokesperson, when asked for comment on the memo, pointed to a social media post made late Wednesday afternoon. It said the department was “exercising its enforcement discretion to no longer pursue” criminal charges of the Clean Air Act based on allegations of tampering with the software associated with emissions control devices.
The memo comes just a few months after Trump pardoned Tony Lake, a Wyoming-based diesel mechanic who served several months in federal prison for conspiring to violate the Clean Air Act by disabling emissions-control devices in a number of diesel trucks. It came after a Wyoming Senate Republican alleged the case represented an example of the Biden administration “weaponizing” prosecution.
Blanche’s order could potentially impact more than a dozen pending criminal cases across the country targeting companies and individuals who allegedly sold after-market emissions defeat devices, as well as more than 20 ongoing investigations, according to two sources familiar with the matter and court filings.
Several of the pending criminal cases, including two in different districts in Pennsylvania, were indicted in 2025 during the first year of Mr. Trump’s second term in office, court filings show.
The Clean Air Act requires the EPA to regulate air pollution levels generated by vehicles.
In order to comply with those rules, auto manufacturers are required to install emissions control systems to reduce the level of pollutants, such as including nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide.
It is unlawful to tamper with those systems, but there’s a robust black market for after-market emissions defeat devices because deleting or tuning them can help boost horsepower and improve mileage.
A study done in 2020 by the EPA found that in the last decade, emissions controls had been removed from about 550,000 diesel pickup trucks, and that led to the emissions of 570,000 tons of excess nitrogen oxides.Â
Ya know, I really just don’t get it. What is the point of rolling coal anyway? It’s not going to make your wife love you, or your boss respect you, or your father finally feel proud of you. Plus, it makes your own truck dirty and smelly and wastes expensive fuel. Is it just about owning the libs? It can’t be, right? Maybe it is that simple.
In the end, all it really does is slowly kill the planet and make everybody’s day a bit worse, but that’s sort of the underlying mantra of this administration, isn’t it?
