Along an 85-mile stretch of Louisiana between New Orleans and Baton Rouge — known as Cancer Alley — families live next to petrochemical plants that release cancer-causing chemicals into the air every day. St. John the Baptist Parish, home to several of these plants, now carries the highest cancer risk from air pollution of anywhere in the country, with the danger there roughly 50 times higher than the U.S. average.

In 2024, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finally stepped in. A new safeguard called the HON rule required petrochemical plants to install stronger pollution controls, monitor toxic chemicals at their fence lines, and stop skipping pollution limits during shutdowns and startups. The EPA projected the rule would cut thousands of tons of toxic air pollution each year and lower nearby cancer risk by 96 percent.

That protection is now being taken apart. The federal government has granted more than 70 temporary exemptions freeing petrochemical facilities from these safeguards, and a full rewrite of the rule — expected to weaken it further — is planned for this fall.

"Everything that the Biden administration did to help protect us was pretty much just thrown in the garbage," said Tish Taylor, whose family lives in St. John the Baptist Parish, according to Yale E360.

Families in Cancer Alley didn't choose to live beside some of the most toxic industrial pollution in America, but they're the ones paying for it with their health. The EPA should restore and enforce the HON rule's full protections — no exemptions.

Sign the petition to demand the EPA restore full protections for Cancer Alley families, before more lives are put at risk.