Political Quotes

“I rise in opposition to my good friend from Texas, Mr. Cuellar's amendment. It may be well intentioned, but it is poorly drafted. He may not have intended it, but if we were to accept it, by allowing the EPA to regulate anything under title 2, he would give the EPA authority not only to regulate tailpipe emissions from cars and trucks, but also authority to regulate trains, planes, and any other mobile source. I don't know that that was his intent, but that is certainly the effect of the amendment. We oppose the amendment for that reason, for the drafting reason. We also oppose the amendment because it is the majority's opinion that we need, after 2017, to have one regulator for mobile sources, and that regulator is NHTSA, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration. This amendment would have three regulators: NHTSA, EPA, and the State of California. We have been very careful in the drafting of the underlying bill to make sure that the existing standards for tailpipe emissions stay in place. This bill does not change that. It would prevent EPA from issuing regulations for CO<INF>2</INF> emissions for tailpipes, but the underlying bill does not prohibit regulating the various emissions under NHTSA and the State of California for tailpipe emissions that actually affect fuel economy. The only thing even without this bill that the EPA would have the ability to regulate are the emissions out of the coolant of the air conditioning systems.…”