Empty Chairs, Dangerous Signals
The Troubling Absence at Pipeline Safety's Most Important Conference
For the first time since 2006, federal pipeline safety regulators failed to show up where it really matters —at the annual Pipeline Safety Trust conference taking place today and tomorrow in New Orleans. This unprecedented absence speaks volumes about priorities at a moment when pipeline safety enforcement appears to be in freefall while the Trump administration pushes for the expansion of oil and gas.
The Trump administration’s decision to skip this conference—made well before any government shutdown excuse could be invoked—represents more than just poor optics. It’s a slap in the face to families like Marlene Robinson’s, who transformed unimaginable grief into decades of advocacy after losing her 18-year-old son Liam in a 1999 Bellingham, Washington pipeline disaster. Robinson, who recently died, was honored by the conference this year.
The numbers tell a damning story. According to a Pipeline Safety Trust analysis, the number of pipeline safety violation enforcement actions dropped 50 percent between January and September 2025, while civil penalties plummeted by an astounding 98%. Other recent data shows enforcement actions in the first quarter of Trump’s second term fell 92% compared to the same period in his first administration—from 68 actions down to just five.
Rather than using a “surgeon’s scalpel” to examine regulations carefully, the Trump administration is wielding a “butcher’s cleaver” that prioritizes profits over safety. - Gary Kenney, Pipeline Safety Expert
The administration claims it’s implementing “data-driven” enforcement priorities and enhancing due process. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy insists regulations should ensure safe transportation, “not as a tool to drive fossil fuels out of business.”
Pipeline safety expert Gary Kenney, with four decades of experience, warned at the conference that rather than using a “surgeon’s scalpel” to examine regulations carefully, the Trump administration is wielding a “butcher’s cleaver” that prioritizes profits over safety. His assessment should alarm anyone living near the 3.3 million miles of pipelines crisscrossing America.
Nowhere is this “butcher’s cleaver” approach more alarming than in the Great Lakes, where Enbridge’s Line 5 pipeline poses catastrophic risks to drinking water for millions. Even as Michigan considers a permit for a proposed Line 5 tunnel through the Straits of Mackinac, sold as a safety solution, federal oversight meant to ensure such projects are built and operated safely is collapsing. The tunnel isn’t a fix; it’s a decade-long construction project followed by a new pipeline requiring exactly the kind of rigorous, continuous federal oversight that just dropped 98%. When regulators won’t even show up to safety conferences, how can Michiganders trust them to enforce tunnel construction standards or monitor a new pipeline for the next 99 years?
The Pipeline Safety Trust conference has always been unique—a rare space where citizens affected by pipeline disasters, industry executives, and regulators come together to prevent future tragedies. When regulators refuse to attend, they miss hearing directly from those who’ve paid the ultimate price for lax oversight. They miss the chance to be held accountable by the very people they’re supposed to protect.
Bellingham’s tragedy gave rise to a movement that achieved real reforms—stricter regulations, better enforcement mechanisms, and the creation of the nation’s only independent pipeline safety watchdog, Pipeline Safety Trust. That progress was never complete under what many consider a historically industry-friendly federal PHSMA. But now even modest progress in pipeline safety appears to be under threat. When enforcement drops 98%, when regulators won’t even show their faces at safety conferences, and when deregulation takes priority over protection, we’re not just risking another Bellingham—we’re practically inviting it into the Great Lakes.
The empty chairs at this year’s conference send a dangerous message: that the hard-won lessons paid for in lives may be forgotten, that industry convenience matters more than community safety, and that the vigilant oversight Marlene Robinson and other grieving parents fought for is now viewed as an unnecessary burden.
Pipeline safety isn’t a partisan issue—it’s about protecting communities from preventable disasters. The next time regulators skip this conference, it might not be empty chairs we’re counting, but casualties.
You are invited to a free webinar about the status of the work to shut down the Line 5 pipeline. Join us on Tuesday, November 18, at 7:00 p.m. EST for "Big Oil vs. Big Water" - a webinar featuring several experts discussing the tribal, legal, and practical efforts to protect the Great Lakes from the risky Line 5 pipeline and infrastructure projects aiming to extend its life.
Thank you, David! And sorry to be missing you in NOLA.
The 98% drop in civil penalties is absolutly staggering. When you combine that with the administration's absence from a safety conference that has been essential for two decades, it shows where priorities actualy lie. The connection to Line 5 is particuarly concerning because the tunnel project relies on the exact oversight that's collapsing. Communities living near these 3.3 million miles of pipelines deserve better than a butcher's cleaver approach to regulation.