Dukakis Attacks Bush on Environment

Michael S. Dukakis made a belated move Thursday to regain control of the environmental issue in the presidential campaign, decrying George Bush’s involvement in some of the Reagan Administration’s most unpopular environmental policies.

Bush, as head of the Reagan Administration’s task force on federal regulations, delayed for years Environmental Protection Agency plans to control toxic wastes, he charged.

And, he said, Bush also tried to prevent the EPA from getting lead out of gasoline.

Thousands of Backers

“Calling George Bush an environmentalist is like calling Dan Quayle a statesman,” Dukakis told several thousand supporters gathered on a lawn at Rutgers University in New Jersey.

Joining the Dukakis supporters were more than 100 noisy members of College Republicans for Bush, who heckled the Democratic candidate.

“We’ve got a certain amount of noise pollution over here,” Dukakis said at one point when the hecklers’ chants grew particularly loud.

After New Jersey, Dukakis flew on to another crucial election battleground, Texas, where he held his first press conference in two weeks.

At the press conference, Dukakis received the endorsement of about 25 Texas district attorneys, sheriffs and other law enforcement officials. He also amplified his position on the emotional issue of gun control, casting his support for some gun restrictions in terms of protecting police.

‘Right to Have Guns’

“I think sportsmen and hunters have a perfect right to have guns,” he said. “People have a right to have guns in their homes to protect themselves subject to state laws.”

“When we ask our police officers to take the kinds of risks that they’re taking . . . the least we can do is provide them with some protection against those who would use guns irresponsibly.”

California, he noted, allows people to buy semi-automatic weapons that easily can be converted to automatics. “That’s what I’m concerned about. People are getting killed.”

Gun control and the environment are both expected to be major issues in California, where Dukakis will campaign today and Saturday.

Much to the chagrin of Democratic strategists, Bush has attacked Dukakis heavily on the environment, emphasizing Massachusetts’ problems cleaning up badly polluted Boston Harbor. Dukakis has now begun trying to get back on top of what has been a strong Democratic issue for two decades.

So far, Dukakis is emphasizing two things--negative aspects of Bush’s record and his own endorsements by environmental groups and major environmental spokesmen. Thursday, for example, he was endorsed formally by the League of Conservation Voters, an umbrella organization for many environmental groups, and was introduced by actor Robert Redford.

Redford brought shrieks from the crowd merely by taking off his coat and provoked a storm of laughter by introducing himself as Dan Quayle, the Republican vice presidential candidate whose campaign literature in the past has touted a resemblance to the actor.

Dukakis made no major new environmental proposals of his own Thursday. He did, however, pledge that by 1996, which would be the end of his Administration if he served two terms, he would guarantee that cleanup “will be completed or well under way” at all 1,200 sites on the national Superfund toxic waste priority list.

So far, the Reagan Administration has cleaned 36 sites and begun cleanup on 101 more.

Dukakis estimates that achieving his goal would cost about $13 billion.

The Superfund program is designed to recover much of that cleanup cost from the polluters themselves. The Reagan Administration has found that goal hard to meet. Administration defenders point out that in many cases, the companies that dumped wastes are now bankrupt. Other times, establishing who is at fault is difficult.

Critics, however, charge that enforcement efforts have been halfhearted, a theme Dukakis has emphasized.

“For the foot-draggers and the chronic polluters,” Dukakis said, “I have just one message: You better vote for Mr. Bush, because if I’m elected, the game is over.”

Dukakis’ criticisms of Bush’s record focused mainly on the Task Force on Regulatory Relief, which Bush often mentions as one of his main jobs during the Administration. The task force was responsible for several controversial environmental decisions during the early years of the Reagan Administration.

On March 25, 1981, for example, Bush announced that the task force had ordered the EPA to suspend an entire program of regulations that the Jimmy Carter Administration had issued to govern the production, use and disposal of potentially hazardous substances.

Major environmental organizations sued, and the federal appeals court in Washington eventually reinstated many of the rules, deciding that Bush’s action had violated the government’s duty under the 1976 Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.

Bush accuses Dukakis of pursuing a demagogic appeal and pledges to keep Social Security sound if elected. Page 34.