Dems mull keeping powder dry Thursday on climate bill

“We will certainly revisit the issue when it [the bill] gets to full Committee,” he told E2.

Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) also said the no-amendments approach is under discussion for Thursday's markup.

“We think it is putrid and you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear,” he said of the legislation. “They are hell-bent on trying to repeal [EPA’s authority] — we think it is outrageous, I think that any fair-minded person would know it is outrageous, and I don’t know that we would want to dignify it.”

“We are still talking about it,” Engel said.

Democratic amendments would be highly unlikely to succeed, but would provide a chance to force votes on measures that highlight Democratic criticisms of repealing EPA’s authority.

Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) is the bill’s lead sponsor, and it currently has 30 co-sponsors, including three Democrats.