EPA

Republican House passes two more bills to put restrictions on EPA

By Bruce Alpert

The Republican-led House Wednesday (March 18) passed the second of two bills this week designed to put new restrictions on the Environmental Protection Agency.

Wednesday's bill requires the EPA to reveal scientific data used by the agency to justify regulations, while a bill passed Tuesday would bar the agency from appointing registered lobbyists to the agency's Science Advisory Board.

"For far too long, the EPA has justified their radical job-killing regulations by hiding behind unverified science veiled in secrecy, while trying to shield their army of unelected bureaucrats from any accountability," said House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, a persistent EPA critic.

 "Today's vote brings commonsense reform and transparency to the EPA by requiring the agency to finally release the data behind their decisions, effectively pulling back the curtain and forcing the EPA to prove that their regulatory proposals can actually be achieved in the real world using real science," Scalise said.

Andrew Rosenberg, director of the Center for Science and Democracy at UCS, said the bills "are a clear threat to long-standing, bipartisan laws that protect Americans."

 "The titles and text of these bills are cleverly designed to conceal their purpose, which is to protect industry from any oversight and any limits on their ability to pollute," Rosenberg said. "They introduce unreasonable requirements, new delays and added levels of bureaucracy, and increase the power of corporations to interfere with laws meant to protect us. It's deceptive and cynical to promote these bills with claims about reform and transparency."

The White Housed issued a veto threat. But Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Tex., said the disclosure bill will force the EPA to release the science behind its rules so that other scientists can analyze the findings and perhaps offer alternative conclusions.

Both bills passed by mostly party line votes -- Wednesday's bill by a 241-175 margin and Tuesday's, 236-181.

Voting yes for both bills were Scalise and Reps. Charles Boustany, R-Lafayette; John Fleming, R-Minden; Ralph Abraham, R-Alto; and Garret Graves, R-Baton Rouge. Voting no on both bills was Rep. Cedric Richmond, D-New Orleans, the delegation's only Democrat.