The taxpayer-funded facility, opened under the Biden administration, attracted fewer than 2,000 visitors in nine months.

By yourNEWS Media Newsroom

President Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency is shutting down the National Environmental Museum and Education Center, a Biden-era initiative criticized by current EPA leadership as politically motivated and fiscally irresponsible. The announcement was made Monday by EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, who described the museum as a “shrine to environmental justice and climate change” funded with $4 million in taxpayer dollars.

“I’m currently standing inside of this museum, which was built and curated by the Biden administration with $4 million in taxpayer dollars,” said Zeldin. “As if this wasn’t enough of a price tag, to fill a room the size of an apartment, this shrine to EJ and climate change costs the American taxpayer $600,000 to operate annually.”

The museum opened in May 2024 under then-EPA Administrator Michael Regan, who said it was intended to “chronicle our nation’s work to protect public health and the environment.” However, the Trump EPA says the facility failed to attract meaningful public interest, recording less than 2,000 external visitors from its opening through February 2025—an average cost to taxpayers of $315 per visitor.

According to agency figures, estimated annual operating expenses included $123,000 for landscaping, $123,000 for utilities, and $54,000 for storing artifacts. Zeldin emphasized that he is committed to “exceptional stewardship of taxpayer dollars” and that the closure reflects the agency’s return to its core mission of environmental protection rather than what he characterized as “bureaucratic self-promotion.”

The Trump administration also criticized the museum’s content for its partisan lean, noting it focused disproportionately on Democrat-led EPA achievements while largely omitting the period between 2014 and January 2021. The facility’s exhibits prioritized climate change and “environmental justice” over foundational EPA work and bipartisan contributions to environmental policy.

“There is something ironic about the EPA wasting money on a museum about itself when it is supposed to be focused on toxic waste,” said Rod Law, communications director for the Functional Government Institute. “Administrator Zeldin closing it protects taxpayers, helps return the EPA to its statutory mission of protecting the environment, and abandons past dysfunction and bureaucratic self-promotion.”

The closure is part of a broader rollback of Biden-era EPA initiatives. Since January, the Trump administration has moved to terminate billions in federal grants to politically-connected environmental nonprofits, deregulate restrictive Biden-era environmental rules, and dismantle offices related to “diversity, equity, and inclusion.”

The EPA did not disclose plans for how the now-vacated museum space will be used, but Zeldin affirmed that no additional taxpayer money would be spent to maintain or repurpose the site in the near term.