Ex-EPA chief Christie Whitman confronted unrelenting criticism Monday as she attended a congressional hearing and maintained that the agency did its best to warn Ground Zero workers about environmental hazards.

Christie Whitman was accused that the EPA failed to warn workers that the air was not safe, allowing them to feel safer than they were.

Whitman responded by saying that the EPA warned those working on Ground Zero to use respirators and masks, while the air in the rest of lower Manhattan was safe for the general public. She emphasized that the EPA’s messages were based on professional reports.

“These were not whims, these were not decisions by a politician. Everything I said was based on what I was hearing from professionals,” Whitman said.

“I think the city of New York did absolutely everything in its power to do what was right by the citizens of New York,” Whitman said.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), whose district included the World Trade Center, questioned the EPA’s statements, saying New York City residents were given a false sense of safety.

The cited studies of more than 20,000 people that showed 7- percent of Ground Zero workers have suffered some sort of respiratory or digestive problem since the attacks.

Whitman answered that the studies she had seen did not reach the same conclusion.