OPINION:
Capitol Hill is busy this week reversing the damage done by President Biden’s last-minute regulatory spree. The former administration relied on unelected bureaucrats to issue a flurry of anti-consumer edicts that the House and Senate are now wiping from the books.
Major decisions affecting entire sectors of the economy are supposed to be made by legislative bodies accountable to the public. Citizens ought to be able to judge how their representatives voted on policies that affect the costs of goods such as appliances, cars and gasoline.
The first item on the Senate’s chopping block Monday was a scheme to nix offshore oil and gas drilling. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management declared that “archaeological reports” were required before any energy extraction could begin, stalling critical projects under the pretense they might disturb a World War II shipwreck in the depths of the Gulf of America.
“I’m not saying that the guy who came up with the idea for this rule is the dumbest person in the world, but I am saying that the guy who came up with this idea for this rule better hope that the dumbest person in the world doesn’t die,” Sen. John Kennedy said.
The Louisiana Republican noted that the entire Gulf of America had been fully surveyed, so this was just a gimmick to artificially inflate the costs of proposing oil and gas projects. The only thing Mr. Biden’s BOEM wanted to do was rubber-stamp requests to place seagull-slicing windmills throughout the Gulf.
New leadership teams at these agencies are reversing course. Earlier this month, the Environmental Protection Agency begged Congress to reassert its authority by overturning waivers that Mr. Biden’s EPA issued to California. The scheme gave the Golden State authority to dictate the designs of cars sold in half the country.
“The American people are struggling to make ends meet while dealing with rules that take away their ability to choose a safe and affordable vehicle for their families. As an agency, we are accountable to Congress, but most importantly we must be accountable to the American people,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a statement.
California hoped to wield the might of the federal EPA to force consumers in 17 states into electric cars and trucks against their will. The state’s efficiency rules would have outlawed the sale of gasoline-powered vehicles by 2035 in the name of “environmental justice and equity.”
In the House, members are voting to jettison Mr. Biden’s scheme that inflated the cost of gas-fired water heaters through unnecessary limitations on their performance. At the time, the EPA justified the regulations as having $349 million in “climate benefits,” as if the global thermometer would budge because someone went to the hardware store and paid nearly double for a less-effective water heater.
President Trump is happy to reverse these obnoxious mandates through executive order, but using the Congressional Review Act is better. The procedure specifically prohibits courts from reviewing repeal decisions while preventing federal agencies from readopting identical policies later.
Repeal resolutions require a simple majority vote in each chamber and a presidential signature to take effect. The latter requirement effectively restricts their use to times when White House ownership changes, like now.
By reclaiming power that should never have been in the hands of unaccountable bureaucrats, Congress is finally doing something that will help lower prices for consumers.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.