Upton, Whitfield huddle with Senate on climate

The lead sponsors of House GOP legislation to kill EPA climate change rules crossed Capitol Hill for Senate meetings Wednesday amid a pending effort by their Senate Republican counterparts to advance the same plan.

House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) -- who heads the panel's energy subcommittee -- walked onto the Senate floor Wednesday evening. They later emerged and went into Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl's (R-Ariz.) office and then into Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's (R-Ky) office.

"We had some brief comments about it. We talked briefly about it," Whitfield said on his way into Kyl's office.

They met with staff in Kyl's office, Upton said, and McConnell was not in his office at the time of the meeting either.

The House committee approved legislation this week to nullify EPA's power to regulate greenhouse gases from power plants, refineries and other sources.

"We are just finding out what they are doing over here," Upton told reporters while en route into McConnell's office.

Senate GOP leaders want to advance the plan -- which is sponsored on the Senate side by Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) -- as an amendment to small business legislation that's currently on the Senate floor.

Senate votes on the block-EPA plan appeared imminent Tuesday and Wednesday but have not occured, and plans appear unsettled after Wednesday's vote didn't materialize.

Key GOP supporters of the plan have accused Democrats of backing off because they fear a bad outcome, but Democrats say that's not true.

The amendment is highly unlikely to win the 60 Senate votes needed for adoption, but a clear majority vote would nonetheless be a political setback for advocates of EPA emissions rules.

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) is a co-sponsor of Inhofe's plan, and some other centrist and politically vulnerable Democrats may back it too.

This post was updated at 6:58 p.m.