Political Interference | Center for Effective Government

House Republicans Return to Attacking Public Health and Environmental Protections

This week, the House of Representatives will vote on a series of anti-regulatory proposals during a campaign targeting important public health and environmental safeguards. While House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) has dubbed the campaign #StopGovtAbuse Week, the proposed legislation is in fact designed to delay or halt the rulemaking process by adding time-consuming and redundant procedural hurdles, by providing regulated industries additional opportunities to delay the process, and by stripping away the public's right to petition agencies when they fail to act.

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State Department Report Acknowledges Climate Change Impacts of Keystone XL

On Jan. 31, the U.S. Department of State published its long-awaited Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the Keystone XL pipeline, which acknowledges, for the first time, that the proposed pipeline could contribute to climate change. On Feb. 3, communities and groups across the country organized over 200 local vigils in 44 states and Washington, DC to let President Obama know the risks that the pipeline will bring. The final EIS report does not provide any recommendations on the pipeline but will be used to develop a recommendation from the State Department and in the president's final decision on the pipeline.

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Standards and Safeguards in 2013

Agencies rolled out few health, safety, or environmental standards in the first quarter of 2013, despite hopes that President Obama would commit more attention to agencies' regulatory agendas after winning reelection. But in the spring, the gears began to move as the administration focused on implementing crucial public protections and the new director of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), Howard Shelanski, made good on his promise to cut the backlog of rules waiting for review at OIRA. With the gridlock on legislation in Congress, many are looking for the administration to be more active in moving rules and action through the executive branch.

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Coal Ash Waste Standards Inch Forward, But Industry Opposition Strong

This December will mark the fifth anniversary of a massive spill of coal ash in Tennessee that destroyed three houses and damaged more than 40 others. This event sparked intensified calls for the regulation of coal ash, a waste by-product produced when coal is burned. Federal efforts to deal with the problem of coal ash have progressed slowly, but agency action on the issue may be gaining momentum in light of recent policy developments. Meanwhile, coal industry proponents in Congress are revamping legislative efforts to thwart national protections against coal waste.

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Congress Continues Efforts to Thwart Climate Change Emissions Limits

On Sept. 20, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced a new proposal to limit carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from new coal-fired power plants. The Center for Effective Government applauded the steady progress on the rule but warned of likely challenges from climate-change deniers, regulatory opponents, and their allies in Congress. Over the past month, these challenges have appeared in the form of draft legislation and appropriations riders that seek to repeal or severely limit EPA's authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from fossil-fueled power plants under the Clean Air Act.

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Court Rejects Industry Challenge to Styrene Listing in the Report on Carcinogens

The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia recently rejected industry challenges to an agency's decision to list the chemical styrene in the Twelfth Report on Carcinogens as "reasonably anticipated" to be a cancer-causing agent. A major styrene trade association and a manufacturer of the substance had sued the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for including styrene in the report.

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Legislation Would Delay Important Safeguards and Limit Citizens' Access to Courts

Earlier this month, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Rep. Doug Collins (R-GA) introduced companion legislation in the House and Senate, entitled the Sunshine for Regulatory Decrees and Settlements Act (S. 714 and H.R. 1493). Disguised as an effort to increase transparency, this legislation aims to bog down the regulatory process with time-consuming and costly procedural hurdles that would limit the lawsuits brought to challenge unreasonable delays by regulatory agencies.

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Open Government Advocates Disappointed by Rollback of STOCK Act Requirements for Online Access

Just a year after enacting it, Congress and the president rolled back a key transparency provision of the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act of 2012 (STOCK Act) instead of amending it to address concerns.

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The Small Business Administration's Office of Advocacy Exaggerates Its Influence

The Office of Advocacy, an independent office within the Small Business Administration (SBA), recently released its annual report to Congress on agency compliance with the Regulatory Flexibility Act (RFA) during fiscal year (FY) 2012. In the report, the office makes dubious claims that its efforts to delay or stop six agency rules saved billions for small businesses in the last fiscal year.

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Anti-Regulatory Forces Target Agency Science to Undermine Health and Safety Standards

As committees of the 113th Congress begin to implement their agendas, it is increasingly apparent that environmental and health standards, and the science serving as the basis for these protections, will remain a favorite target of anti-regulatory legislators. Last session's industry-supported proposals to change scientific assessment programs would undermine environmental, health, and safety standards, yet they are likely to reappear. Meanwhile, new investigations underscore that these measures ignore the real impediments to improving the credibility and usefulness of agency science and risk assessments.

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