"A 2020 Center for Public Integrity investigation found uneven oversight of the chemical in the United States, even after efforts to strengthen federal rules," Wertz reports. Ammonium nitrate "has been a key component of catastrophic industrial accidents and terrorism, including the 2013 blast at an agricultural-products retailer that killed 15 and injured 260 people in Texas, and the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City that killed 168."
After the Texas disaster, then-President Obama ordered officials to reduce the risks of hazardous chemicals, but agriculture lobbyists sought to block broad amendments to the Environmental Protection Agency's risk-management program, Wertz reports.
The Trump administration has tried to eliminate the Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, which probes such industrial accidents; though he's not been able to convince Congress to defund the CSHIB,"he’s kept it from releasing its reports by not filling the board’s four vacant seats, Public Integrity reported," Wertz reports.
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