Gillibrand maintains anti-tax stance for farms on EPA proposal

UPDATED 7:24 PM

Democratic lawmakers on Thursday threatened to derail climate change legislation unless the bill addresses concerns of the farming and forestry industry.  Senator Kirsten Gillibrand's, D-NY, office told the Washington Times editorial page today that she stands behind her position from December of 2008, which is farmers should not be taxed for methane emissions coming from their farms.  While in the House, Ms. Gillibrand served on the Agricultural Committee herself, and a local NBC  news station reported back in December of 2008,:

So Hanehan and other New York farmers are asking Congress to step in to make sure this idea of taxing farms for flatulence is expelled swiftly.

New York Representative Kirsten Gillibrand, a Democrat on the Agriculture Committee, says the whole idea stinks.

"The first thing I'm going to do is call the chairman of our Agriculture Committee and talk to him about this and how it's upset my farmers and ask him how quickly we can get this done," she said. 

 The video below is a local New York tv news package about the Environmental Protection Agency's(EPA) prior attempt to tax farmers over methane emissions.  In the video, then Congresswoman Gillibrand speaks out forcefully against the foul smelling tax. 

Ms. Gillibrand is known for flip flopping on the gun issue ,  amending her views on same-sex marriage, and  changing her tune on immigration since resigning as New York's 20th congressional district's representative and replacing Hillary Clinton, now Secretary of State for the Obama administration, as New York's jr. senator.  Ms. Gillibrand, however, is bucking the Obama EPA on the issue of using the clean air act to tax farms over greenhouse gas emissions.  

As of now, Ms. Gillibrand's stance may be positive news for farmers concerned about the EPA's latest attempt to regulate them, but her record has become extensively more liberal since joining the Senate, and it could be difficult to count on New York's jr. senator to fight against this kind of taxation as vociferously as she once had.