Maura Healey

Built World

Activated state emergency operations center, directed non-emergency employees to stay home; declared state of emergency and deployed 200 National Guard troops

A historic nor'easter that developed into a bomb cyclone on February 22-23, 2026, buried the Interstate 95 corridor from Philadelphia to Boston under one to two feet of heavy, wet snow, with final totals exceeding 2 feet in parts of New Jersey (30.7 inches in Lyndhurst) and 19 inches in New York City on February 24. Wind gusts reached 70 mph, snowfall rates hit 2-3 inches per hour, and coastal flooding impacted 80 to 100 million people across the Mid-Atlantic to New England.

Updated Feb 24

Rule Changes

Part of four-state coalition demanding classified briefing on wind pause

On December 22, 2025, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum paused every major offshore wind farm under construction off the East Coast. Vineyard Wind, Revolution Wind, Sunrise Wind, Empire Wind, and Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind—representing $28 billion in investment and enough power for millions of homes—all stopped work on orders from Washington citing radar interference and national security risks near military installations.

Updated Feb 10

Rule Changes

Declared January 2026 as Firefighter Cancer Awareness Month

Maryland became the latest battleground in a national fight to protect firefighters from cancer when the James Malone Act took effect January 1, 2026, requiring every county with a self-insured health plan to provide free cancer screenings to professional firefighters—no copays, no deductibles, no excuses. The law, named for former Delegate Jimmy Malone who died of brain cancer in December 2024 after decades in the fire service, targets ten cancer types that kill firefighters at dramatically higher rates than the general population. The same month Maryland's law launched, President Trump's signature on the Honoring Our Fallen Heroes Act expanded federal death benefits to families of firefighters who die from occupational cancer—putting the federal government's stamp on what firefighters have been saying for years: cancer is a line-of-duty death.

Updated Feb 5

Rule Changes

Won court victory for Vineyard Wind on January 27, clearing final 18 turbines to complete 800 MW project

Five federal judges delivered consecutive defeats to Trump's offshore wind freeze between January 13 and February 2, 2026. All five suspended East Coast projects—Revolution Wind, Empire Wind, Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, Vineyard Wind, and Sunrise Wind—won preliminary injunctions clearing them to resume construction, representing over $25 billion in investment and 6+ gigawatts of capacity. Judge Brian Murphy's January 27 ruling on Vineyard Wind found the government 'failed to provide a reasonable explanation' for halting the 95%-complete project, calling the action 'likely arbitrary and capricious.' Judge Royce Lamberth's February 2 ruling on Sunrise Wind, the final project at 45% completion, completed the legal sweep. All five projects are now operating under court orders while litigation continues.

Updated Feb 4

Built World

In office since January 2023

For 40 years, Hydro-Québec wanted to sell more power to New England. For 40 years, transmission bottlenecks and local opposition stopped them. On January 16, 2026, a 145-mile power line through Maine's western woods began delivering 1,200 megawatts of Canadian hydroelectricity to Massachusetts—enough to supply 20% of the state's needs and the largest clean energy transmission addition to New England's grid in decades. Ten days later, during a winter storm, the line went dark.

Updated Jan 30