Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell made the following remarks on the Senate floor regarding job-destroying EPA regulations that were the subject of a U.S. Supreme Court argument earlier today:

“I spent the morning over at the Supreme Court.

“I was there to support the plaintiffs in a very important case against overreach by the Environmental Protection Agency.

“And here’s why I say this case is important — not only for Kentucky but for all Americans.

“First of all, it involves the all-important question of whether elections still matter in this country.

“I say that because four years ago, President Obama tried to push far-reaching energy-regulating legislation through a Congress that was dominated by his own party: the cap and trade bill.

“But even with then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi and a Democrat Majority Leader in the Senate on his side, he couldn’t do it.

“A Democrat-controlled Congress beat back the President’s plan to radically upend energy regulation in this country. They stopped his national energy tax.

“Just a few months later, the American people rendered a harsh verdict on the Obama agenda in an electoral wipeout that the President himself referred to as a ‘shellacking.’

“Others have described the November 2010 midterm elections as a national restraining order.

“My point here is that this should have been the end of the story on the President’s energy regulation plan.

“Instead, it was just the beginning.

“The President’s base wasn’t about to back off from divisive policies just because they couldn’t achieve them legislatively. So the Far-Left fringe pressured the White House to push similar regulations through the back door, to achieve through presidential fiat what they couldn’t achieve through legislation.

“And that’s just what the Obama Administration has done.

“The Administration has attempted to use statutes like the Clean Air Act to regulate things those laws were never intended to regulate.

“And the Administration itself effectively acknowledges that if it actually followed the plain language of the Clean Air Act in regulating carbon emissions – that that would lead to ‘absurd results.’

“So here’s what the Obama Administration decided to do about the absurdity: just unilaterally rewrite the parts of the law it didn’t like. On its own. Without the input of Congress – the branch of government that’s supposed to write our laws.

“This kind of presidential overreach is something that should concern every member of this body, regardless of party.

“And from a constitutional perspective, this is a wholly troubling practice that needs to be rectified by the court.
“But this case is about more than just constitutional theory: it’s also about people’s lives.

“Regardless of their constitutionality, the energy regulations imposed by this Administration are just bad policy.

“Coupled with cheaper natural gas, the Administration’s regulations have helped foster hardship in many of America’s coal communities.

“Hardship that’s ruined lives and that’s hurt some of the most vulnerable people in our country.

“And in Kentucky, these regulations have helped devastate families who haven’t done anything wrong, other than to be on the wrong side of a certain set of liberals who don’t seem to approve of the hard work they do to support their families.

“When Obama took office there were more than 18,000 coal jobs in Kentucky. At last count, that figure has dropped to less than 12,000 – with Eastern Kentucky coal employment dropping by 23.4 percent just this past year alone.

“So let’s be clear: these regulations are unfair. And they represent the conquest of liberal elites imposing their political will on working class Kentuckians who just want to feed their families.

“That’s why I’ve filed an amicus brief in this case. It’s on behalf of the Kentuckians who are voiceless in this debate – the families that find themselves on the losing end of a quote-unquote ‘War’ that’s been declared upon them by their own government.

“I held a listening session on these EPA regulations with coal miners in December, and many of their stories were heart-breaking.

“Just listen to what Howard Abshire of Fedscreek had to say:

‘I say to you, Mister President of the United States… We're hurting. You say you're the president of the people? Well we're people too. No one loves the mountains…more than we do. We live here. We crawl between them. We get up every morning and we go on top of a mountain in a strip job in the cold rain, snow, to put bread on the table … Come and look at our little children, look at our people, Mr. President. You're not hurting for a job; you've got one. I don't have one.’

“I hope the President is listening.

“As far as the Supreme Court is concerned, it now has the opportunity to end this latest abuse of the Constitution by the Obama Administration

“I hope the Justices will make the right decision in this case.

“Either way, I’m going to keep fighting.

“I’ve already filed a proposal that would allow Congress to have its say on the Administration’s job-killing regulations.

“And it’s time for Washington elites to think about ways to help, instead of hurt, the hard-working people of Eastern and Western Kentucky.”