President Trump, who has denounced the media, among others, as "bloodsuckers," is taking aim at the real thing in Washington, DC. On Tuesday, the president signed an executive order directing federal agencies to slash the capital's invasive mosquito population by 90% and ticks by 50% by 2028, Politico reports. The Environmental Protection Agency will lead the effort, fast-tracking a regulatory framework for tools like sterilization, genetic tweaks, and bacteria-based "mosquito birth control," so long as Administrator Lee Zeldin deems them "both safe and effective." Agencies have 60 days to map out how they'll hit the targets.
- The executive order says the campaign will also "remediate tick and mosquito breeding grounds on lands subject to Federal jurisdiction throughout DC, including by reducing tick and mosquito habitats through landscaping and drainage improvements."
- Mosquitoes have long been a problem in DC and complaints have "historically crossed party lines," the Washington Post notes.
Google and others are awaiting EPA approval for projects that use the Wolbachia bacteria to render male mosquitoes sterile. The order also lets Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. offer prize money for new treatments under his "Lyme Disease Moonshot." On his podcast in 2024, the year before he became health secretary, Kennedy promoted a conspiracy theory that Lyme disease was a bioweapon created in a US military lab in Long Island. "And we cannot say 100% for sure, but we do know that they were experimenting with ticks there," he said, per USA Today.
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