Political Quotes

“This amendment makes needed changes to the economic analysis mandated by the underlying bill; but fundamentally this bill, itself, we believe, is an assault on the Clean Air Act, not really a bill that requires a study. The legislation began in committee as a bill to require a new study on the economic impacts of EPA rules to cut air pollution. At that point, the bill simply required a burdensome and redundant study of EPA rules and did not affect any of the rules it proposed to examine. It changed in committee. The Republican members amended it to indefinitely delay implementation of two very key rules to reduce power plant pollution, the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule and the Mercury and Air Toxics Rule. Now Mr. Whitfield has proposed amending the bill to further eliminate those rules altogether and prevent EPA from being able to clean up power plants in the future. Mr. Latta has offered an amendment to force EPA to listen to polluters' accountants rather than scientists when setting air quality standards. This bill is now a direct attack on the heart of the Clean Air Act. That act has saved thousands of lives. The bill still contains a study on the economic impact of EPA rules, although I'm not sure why it would do that. The Rush amendment, Mr. Chairman, would make the study required by this legislation a little less biased and a little more useful. The bill creates a new government bureaucracy to conduct a complicated study of EPA rules. It's not necessary.…”