Jacqueline Cohen

Jacqueline Cohen is the Senior Vice President of the Environmental Policy Practice at Waxman Strategies.  She brings over a decade of experience at the forefront of Congressional negotiations on environmental issues to the firm.

During her time in Congress, Jacqueline fought to protect the environment and public health from a broad range of threats, including climate change, drinking water contamination, toxic substances in consumer products, contaminated sites, and dangerous chemical facilities.  Overarching all of her work has been a commitment to pursuing environmental justice and a belief that a clean and healthy environment is a human right.

One of the highlights of Jacqueline’s career has been the successful effort to reform the Toxic Substances Control Act.  She first began working on TSCA reform as a law student, and ten years later, she led negotiations for Democrats in the House of Representatives to enact the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act.  Along the way, she conducted oversight of regulatory processes on chemicals at the Environmental Protection Agency, Consumer Product Safety Commission, and the Chemical Safety Board.  Since enactment of the Lautenberg Act, Jacqueline has worked to hold the Environmental Protection Agency accountable to ensure the new law is implemented as intended, so that consumers, states, and the general public can have confidence in our federal chemical regulations.

Jacqueline is also passionate about increasing access to safe and affordable drinking water.  She has led efforts to write and enact drinking water legislation including the Assistance Quality and Affordability (AQUA) Act of 2010, the Reduction of Lead in Drinking Water Act of 2011, the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation Act of 2016, the American’s Water Infrastructure Act of 2018, and the drinking water infrastructure and affordability provisions included in the American Rescue Plan, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and the Build Back Better Act.  She hopes to see more work done in the future to increase and improve EPA’s authority to set drinking water standards that fully protect vulnerable populations and overburdened communities.

In recent years, Jacqueline’s work expanded to include efforts to fight climate change.  As the lead of the Energy and Commerce Committee’s Environment and Climate Change team, she was proud to lead the effort to introduce the CLEAN Future Act, the first comprehensive climate legislation introduced in Congress in over a decade.  She was particularly proud of the work that went into ensuring that bill included robust provisions to address environmental justice.

Jacqueline holds a J.D. from Harvard Law School and a Science Bachelors in Applied Mathematics/Biology from Brown University.  She is a native of the Washington, DC area, where she currently resides with her husband and two children.  In her free time, she enjoys playing with her kids, swimming, gardening, knitting.