Political Quotes

“Mr. President, it was fairly recently that this summer I came to the Senate floor to commend the Environmental Protection Agency for finalizing what we called the cross-State air pollution rule, which limits the out-of-State pollution that one State can dump into the wind currents that drop on other States. To my State, Rhode Island, this is particularly important. Nearly a decade after the EPA began working to address this problem of interstate air pollution, we finally had a path forward that is sensible and protective of public health. That was then, this is now. Today, Senator Paul of Kentucky proposes to halt this progress, to undo that rule through a Congressional Review Act resolution. That resolution would, one, void the cross-State air pollution rule and, two, bar EPA permanently from ever writing a ``substantially similar'' rule. This means that EPA could never use the Clean Air Act to create a cost-effective pollution trading program to address upwind pollution. Mr. President, this hits home in my State of Rhode Island. Rhode Island has the sixth highest rate of asthma in the country. More than 11 percent of the people in my State suffer from this chronic disease, and many of them are children. In 2009 there were 1,750 hospital discharges in Rhode Island for asthma cases. Those hospital stays cost about $8 million in direct medical costs, not to mention the costs of the medication or missed days of work and school.…”