Two House Democrats float Murkowski plan to block EPA climate rules

Two centrist Democrats – Reps. Ike Skelton (Mo.) and Collin Peterson (Minn.) -- on Thursday floated a House version of Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s (R-Alaska) resolution to thwart upcoming EPA climate change rules.

Murkowski quickly emphasized the Democratic support.

“There is bipartisan and bicameral agreement that command-and-control regulations from EPA are not the right way to reduce the emissions blamed for climate change,” she said in a prepared statement Friday morning.

Peterson and Skelton chair the Agriculture and Armed Services committees, respectively, and Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (R-Mo.) is also sponsoring their resolution.

The House and Senate resolutions would nullify EPA’s power by using the Congressional Review Act, a mid-1990s law that allows Congress to overturn regulations but the law has been used successfully just once.

The “resolution of disapproval” would overturn EPA’s “endangerment finding” that greenhouse gases are a threat to humans. The finding is the legal underpinning for regulations that EPA plans to issue.

Murkowski currently has 40 co-sponsors for her plan, including three Democrats. She may bring the resolution, which cannot be filibustered, to the floor next month.

The resolutions face large hurdles clearing Congress and face a White House veto. But various Capitol Hill efforts to block EPA rules have already prompted the agency to slow down its plans.

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) is expected to introduce a bill soon that would temporarily halt EPA’s power to limit emissions from sources like power plants and refineries.

Rockefeller says a time-out is needed to give Congress time to complete a sweeping climate change and energy bill, which has been sputtering in the Senate.

Back in the House, the Skelton-Peterson-Emerson resolution is their second joint proposal to block EPA.