In a significant move towards deregulation, Lee Zeldin, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), declared on Tuesday that his agency is set to dismantle the basis of numerous regulations imposed on Americans since the Obama era.
Zeldin, in a video shared on a social media platform, termed the repeal of the endangerment finding as the "largest deregulatory action in the history of America."
The endangerment finding was issued by the EPA following a 2007 Supreme Court ruling that classified greenhouse gases as pollutants under the Clean Air Act. As reported by Axios, in 2009, former President Barack Obama empowered the EPA to set emission standards for sources that could be proven to impact health.
During his appearance on the "Ruthless" podcast on Tuesday, Zeldin elaborated on the reasons behind the agency's pursuit of the rule's repeal. He explained the common misconceptions about the endangerment finding, stating, "If you were to ask congressional Democrats to describe what it is, the left would say that it means that carbon dioxide is a pollutant, carbon dioxide is an endangerment to human health. They might say methane is a pollutant, methane is an endangerment to human health." Zeldin dismissed this as an oversimplified and inaccurate description.
According to Zeldin, the rule was primarily based on leaps of liberal logic. He pointed out that the Obama administration claimed that carbon dioxide, when combined with other greenhouse gases, contributes to climate change. However, the extent of this contribution was never specified, except that it was more than zero. He criticized the administration for focusing only on mobile sources like vehicles, despite many greenhouse gases not being emitted from such sources.
Zeldin further highlighted the implications of the endangerment finding, stating, "Well, then, there were all sorts of vehicle regulations that followed." Josh Holmes, co-host of "Ruthless," described the finding as "the hub to the spoke of the left's environmental agenda." Zeldin concurred, referring to the repeal as akin to "driving a dagger into the heart of the climate change religion."
The EPA Administrator argued that environmental extremists have had their way, leading to detrimental economic consequences. He emphasized that while most Americans, including conservatives, care about the environment and strive to be good stewards, some people are willing to bankrupt the country in the name of climate change. He criticized the misappropriation of funds in the name of environmental justice, stating, "In the name of environmental justice, they will get tens of billions of dollars appropriated to their friends, rather than actually remediating environmental issues."
Zeldin further explained the impact of the endangerment finding, stating, "So they created this endangerment finding, and then they're able to put all these regulations on vehicles, on airplanes, on stationary sources, to basically regulate out of existence, in many cases, a lot of forms of segments of our economy, and it costs Americans a lot of money." He stressed the significance of the repeal, stating, "It's one agency, in one year, doing more deregulation than the entire federal government, across all agencies across entire presidencies, when you look back in history. That's how much of a mess it is that we inherited," as per Fox News. He concluded by criticizing the left for going "so far overboard."
This move by the EPA signifies a significant shift towards deregulation and a departure from the environmental policies of the previous administration. It underscores the current administration's commitment to reducing regulatory burdens, while raising questions about its approach to addressing environmental issues and climate change.
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