The Fight Over EV Rules In California Misses The Big Picture

The party that is always screaming about “states’ rights” and “government overreach” at the top of its lungs has now revealed itself to be nothing more than a bunch of braying jackasses. For 30 years, California has been granted waivers by both Republican and Democratic administrations that allowed it to enact stricter exhaust emissions standards than those prescribed by the federal government. But on May 22, 2025, the US Senate voted to revoke those waivers.

It was a smashmouth moment for Republicans. Two years ago, Texas announced it would enforce its own border, despite that task being specifically delegated to the federal government by the Constitution. Seeking to avoid a confrontation between state and federal law enforcement personnel, the Biden administration sent a strongly worded letter to the governor of Texas, who immediately tore it up and threw it in the trash.

Republicans cheered their duly chosen lunatic, Greg Abbott, and nominated him for sainthood. They also punished bankers for backing “woke” fiscal theories that encouraged companies to make at least a token effort to comply with the Paris climate Accords, accusing the banks of conspiracy and racketeering because they dared to devise a common strategy to avoid turning the Earth into a burnt cinder.

But now Senate Republicans are talking out of the other side of their mouths as they move to crush California’s desire to protect its citizens from tailpipe emissions that not only contribute to rising temperatures but also create a greater risk of respiratory and cardiac disease.

Many people today are suffering from asthma or have family members who are. Asthma is related to many things, and oxides of nitrogen, which are created when gasoline and diesel fuel are burned inside internal combustion engines, are one of those things. Medical professionals claim that breathing in oxides of nitrogen is like giving the inside of our lungs a sunburn. Shouldn’t a state have the ability to reduce that risk if it can? Republicans don’t think so.

CleanTechnica readers, being a savvy lot, remember that when the Moron of Mar-A-Loco was on the rampage the last time, he tried to get the EPA to strip California of the waiver that allows it to set its own exhaust emission standards. That effort was unsuccessful, but the right wing crazies have been plotting their revenge ever since. This time around, the used a legal device to do what they could not do before. Hiding behind the Congressional Review Act, a law signed by Bill Clinton in 1966 as part of his Contract With America initiative., Senate Republicans (and one Democrat) blew up California’s waiver once and for all.

According to Wikipedia, the CRA “empowers Congress to review, by means of an expedited legislative process, new federal regulations issued by government agencies and, by passage of a joint resolution, to overrule a regulation. Once a rule is thus repealed, the CRA also prohibits the reissuing of the rule in substantially the same form or the issuing of a new rule that is substantially the same form unless the reissued or new rule is specifically authorized by a law enacted after the date of the joint resolution disapproving the original rule. Congress has a window of time lasting 60 legislative days to disapprove of any given rule by simple-majority vote; otherwise, the rule will go into effect at the end of that period.”

California Gets Mugged By The Senate

Most readers will notice the CRA was the brain child of a Democratic administration. This is not the only time a Democratic initiative has come back to bite progressives. In 2013, Senate president Harry Reed engineered a work-around that prevented Republicans from blocking federal appointments by Barack Obama. He changed the Senate rules to require a simple majority rather than the 60 votes previously required to bring an end to filibusters for all nominations except those to the Supreme Court.

According to USA Today, after the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell said, “So all you Democrats, if it wasn’t for your party changing the rule in 2013 you would now have the votes to stop Trump from replacing Ginsburg. If you want to blame somebody for screwing you out of the chance to stop Trump from filling this seat, you can put the blame right where it belongs, your own party and the people you elected to run it.”

That was when McConnell changed the Senate rules again to permit the confirmation of Supreme Court nominees by a simple majority. So it is not true, as many believe, that Democrats changed the rules for Supreme Court nominees, but it is true that they created the precedent and McConnell simply seized the opportunity presented. Logicians call this the “slippery slope” argument. Others simply caution, “Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it.”

Democrats created the CRA and now Repugnicans are using it to hammer California. What a mess. According to NPR, the Government Accountability Office and the Senate parliamentarian, both of whom serve as referees within the federal government, determined that using the CRA was not a proper use of that law. But the GAO’s opinion is merely advisory. The parliamentarian’s guidance is also non-binding. Nevertheless, their input has traditionally been followed by the Senate except on very rare occasions.

“Historically, leaders of both parties have feared that if they act unilaterally to change the Senate’s norms, the other party will do the same when they’re in power. That’s exactly what happened in 2013 and 2017, when first Democrats and then Republicans deployed the ‘nuclear option’ to eliminate the filibuster for judicial nominees,” NPR says in its report.

Right on cue, Senator Chuck Schumer, the minority leader in the Senate, reacted with predictable fury, “Today it’s all about California emission waivers. But tomorrow, the CRA could now be used to erase any policy from an agency that the Trump administration doesn’t like at a simple majority threshold, Republicans should tread carefully today. What goes around comes around.” Indeed it does, Chuck. In fact it just did.

Let The War Of Words Begin

Reaction has been swift on all sides of the issue, with fossil fuel interests and automakers celebrating as if they had won a great victory by forcing Californians to keep breathing polluted air and environmentalists wringing their hands in despair. For its part, the government of California has rushed to the nearest federal courthouse to get an order that will prevent the Senate’s action from taking effect. One argument that may have some merit is that the CRA does not apply to waivers.

California governor Gavin Newsom, who many think may be positioning himself for a presidential campaign in 2028, said in a statement after the last election, “The freedoms we hold dear in California are under attack — and we won’t sit idle. California has faced this challenge before, and we know how to respond.” But Michael Buschbacher, an attorney who represent groups opposed to the waiver, told the Detroit Free Press that  said California is “pretty limited” in its legal options. “The CRA has a provision that says that, basically, anything Congress does under the CRA is not subject to judicial review.”

He  also questioned California’s ability to get a waiver for similar rules later on, if or when Democrats return to power in Washington. “The CRA also says that federal agencies cannot do something substantially similar to a rule that gets CRA’ed. That phrase has not really been tested in court. The way I would interpret it would be: California can’t get a waiver from the EPA for electric vehicle mandates.”

A number of other states have adopted the California exhaust emissions rules, but some have already begun walking back their position, no doubt fearing what retaliatory action the failed administration might take against them if they do not.

What is happening here may not be clear to all, but it amounts to this. The anti-EV crowd have won a victory, but are losing the war. They are like passengers on an airplane far out over the ocean that has lost one of its engines. Instead of taking corrective action, the passengers are urging the pilot to pile on more power because they are afraid they will miss their connection if the plane is late arriving at its destination. The idea that they may never reach their destination is conveniently overlooked. Short sighted solutions to long term problems are not very effective.