Call to Action: Short Time for U.S. Senate to Protect the DNFSB; Contact Your Senators Today

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board is a small, independent federal agency that serves as a watchdog for the Department of Energy’s nuclear weapons complex. It is supposed to have five members, but it currently has only two.  And one member’s term expires on October 18^th.  If one or more board positions aren’t filled on or before October 18^th, the Safety Board will no longer have a quorum to operate. The public needs the Board to continue its vital nuclear safety mission at the DOE nuclear weapons facilities.  https://www.dnfsb.gov/ , Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board:  Opportunities Exist to Further Improve Management and Planning, GAO-25-107948, https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-25-107948

Please contact your U.S. Senators and tell them to support a provision in the Continuing Resolution to fund the government for fiscal year 2026.  The provision should preserve the Safety Board’s ability to function even if its membership drops and allow the President additional time to nominate new board members.

Nuclear Watch New Mexico prepared an organizational statement for sign-ons, available here:  https://forms.gle/TK33FCeYXQX9fuaY9  TO BE INCLUDED, SIGN-ON BY CLOSE OF BUSINESS TODAY (Sorry for late notice).

The sign-on letter will be sent to the Senate and House Congressional Leaders on Friday morning, September 26^th.

Action is needed now to urge Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and other Senators to protect the Safety Board so it can continue its vital missions at DOE defense nuclear facilities. Call Chuck Schumer in Washington, DC at (202) 224-6542.

In New Mexico, the Safety Board’s work is essential at the three Department of Energy sites. They are Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Sandia National Laboratories and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) – all three tasked with expanded missions, including national security, fabrication of plutonium triggers for nuclear weapons and disposing of the plutonium-contaminated waste.

In the August 2025 Safety Board’s monthly report for WIPP, a deep underground disposal site for plutonium-contaminated waste, the public learned about how a waste hoist, which was transporting facility personnel to the surface, tripped. Fortunately the safety device initiated a stop. Instead of taking the hoist out of service to investigate the problem as required, facility personnel continued to transport personnel to the surface.  https://www.dnfsb.gov/sites/default/files/2025-09/WIPP%20Monthly%20Ending%20August%202025.pdf

and

In the August 2025 weekly reports about worker contamination at LANL’s Plutonium Facility, the public learned that a worker received a puncture wound through the protective glove he was wearing while working in a glovebox.

https://www.dnfsb.gov/sites/default/files/2025-08/Los%20Alamos%20Week%20Ending%20August%201%202025.pdf , https://www.dnfsb.gov/sites/default/files/2025-08/Los%20Alamos%20Week%20Ending%20July%204%202025.pdf

The next week, the Safety Board reported that contamination was leaking out of two window gaskets and another port gasket in a glovebox. In addition, unapproved chemical processing operations had been done in the glovebox, which is now out-of-service.   https://www.dnfsb.gov/sites/default/files/2025-08/Los%20Alamos%20Week%20Ending%20August%208%202025.pdf

The incidents at LANL and WIPP may have harmed workers.  The public would not necessarily know about them but for the Safety Board’s reports.  These are but a few of the many reasons why the Safety Board must retain its quorum.

1. Friday, September 26^th from noon to 1 pm – Join us at the intersection of East Alameda and Sandoval for the weekly one-hour peaceful protest for nuclear disarmament and against expanded plutonium pit production at LANL. Join with Veterans for Peace, CCNS, Nuclear Watch NM, Loretto Community, New Mexico Peace Fest, Pax Christi and others. Bring your flags, signs and banners in support of nuclear weapons disarmament.

2. Friday, September 26^th at 10 am MDT – Final opportunity to discuss the draft NM Environment Department amendments to the NM Standards for Ground and Surface Water Protection at 20.6.2 NMAC and the new NM draft regulations known as the New Mexico Pollutant Discharge Elimination System at 20.6.5 NMAC.

For more information:  https://www.env.nm.gov/events-calendar/?trumbaEmbed=view%3Devent%26eventid%3D189342697

The public comment period begins August 29^th and closes October 28, 2025.

3. Friday, September 26^th – International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons (Nuclear Abolition Day). https://www.nuclearabolitionday.org/

4. Friday, September 26^th from 8 am – 10 am MDT – Ministerial level conference at the United Nations Headquarters to promote the entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). The Treaty is designed to prohibit all nuclear weapon test explosion for all time.  The event will be streamed live on UN Web TV.  ctbto.org

5. Saturday, October 4 to Saturday, October 11 – Keep Space for Peace Week – Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space. This year could be one of the most important times ever since the 1992 founding of the Global Network, especially with Trump’s recent declaration for the “Golden Dome” over North America.  It is time to resist this boondoggle scheme.  Projected Congressional costs:  $550 billion to trillions over 20 years.  https://space4peace.org/keep-space-for-peace-week/   

6. Saturday, October 18^th – No Kings Day – the next nationwide day of protest and resistance.

7. Thursday, November 13^th and Friday, November 14^th – International Uranium Film Festival at the Navajo National Museum in Window Rock. For more information, visit: https://uraniumfilmfestival.org/

Tags: contamination of workers, Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, Department of Energy, DNFSB, DOE, FY 2026 Continuing Resolution, glovebox, LANL, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Nuclear Watch New Mexico, quorum, Sandia National Laboratories, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senator Ben Ray Lujan, Senator Martin Heinrich, Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, WIPP