A large number of studies have shown that the burden of air pollution in the United States is not evenly shared.

It falls disproportionately on racial minorities, especially blacks.

In 2022, the Biden administration began investigating whether Louisiana's approval of where industrial plants are located,

disproportionately affected minorities in that state, even unintentionally.

But last month, the federal judge said the administration in that's state even unintentionally.

But last month the federal judge said the administration can't do that

and can only investigate regulatory decisions

that are intentionally discriminatory.

While that ruling is limited to Louisiana, 23 Republican

governors had already asked the EPA to scrap that approach.

Beverly Wright heads the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice.

This case started in St. John the Baptist. Deep South Center for Environmental Justice.

This case started in St. John the Baptist Parish in Louisiana.

Tell us more about that place,

what it looks like and who lives there.

It came out of St. John Parish with the site is the same across what is called Cancer Alley,

where we have the third highest cancer rate in a nation and an 85 mile stretch of land between

New Orleans and Baton Rouge with over 156 petrochemical

plants and six refineries, over 200 million pounds of pollution.

That number is almost comparable to the amount of pollution in the state of Texas.

All of the research basically shows that it was intentional and we can show places where

white community members were actually moved away from areas while

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