WASHINGTON, D.C. — Despite leadership from Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and many others, today’s Congressional Review Act vote shows the majority of senators at odds with the urgency of the climate crisis. The Senate today has refused to block a harmful Trump EPA rule placing coal company interests ahead of the health and safety of the American people, our lands, and our wildlife. 

“The so-called Affordable Clean Energy rule, the Environmental Protection Agency’s replacement to the Clean Power Plan, is neither clean nor affordable,” said Shannon Heyck-Williams, director of climate and energy policy at the National Wildlife Federation. “As the world’s second largest emitter of carbon dioxide, the United States should be leading the way on efforts to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. Instead, our EPA has finalized a rule that would allow coal power plants to spew more carbon and other air pollution, leaving our society to continue paying the costs in health problems, rising seas, superstorms, and degraded natural resources. 

“The Clean Power Plan would have reduced emissions from the power sector 32 percent by 2030. Today’s failure to block the rollback of the Affordable Clean Energy rule creates an uncertain future for our economy, public health, and the wildlife that calls our nation home.”

The Congressional Review Act empowers Congress to review new federal regulations through an expedited legislative process by passage of a joint resolution to overrule a regulation. It’s been used successfully 16 times during the Trump presidency.