Senate strikes down Biden administration's climate regulations targeting car emissions

The Senate voted Wednesday afternoon in favor of passing a bill reversing the Biden administration's actions mandating states to track and set reduction goals for greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles on highways.

The chamber approved the resolution in a 53-47 vote in which Sens. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, Jon Tester, D-Mont., and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., joined every Republican voting in the affirmative. The bill was introduced in February by Sens. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., and Manchin.

"Few things are more frustrating in government than un-elected bureaucrats asserting authority they don’t have and foisting federal mediocrity on the excellence of states," Cramer said in floor remarks earlier Wednesday. 

"The Senate will take up my bipartisan resolution that overturns the Biden administration’s obviously illegal rule that requires state departments of transportation to measure CO2 tailpipe emissions then set declining targets for vehicles traveling on the highway systems of their respective states," he continued.

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The resolution is a response to regulations the Department of Transportation's Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) finalized in November, which the agency said supports President Biden’s "whole-of-government approach" of reducing carbon emissions by 50% by 2030. 

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said at the time that the regulations provide states with the flexibility to set their own climate targets.

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However, Cramer and other lawmakers argued the FHWA overstepped its congressional authority in issuing the regulations, which essentially impose performance measures on state departments of transportation and metropolitan planning organizations. Cramer blasted the FHWA for justifying the rules by saying Congress did not explicitly bar the action.

"The Biden administration should have never introduced this rule. But now we, the policymaking branch of government, must end it," the North Dakota Republican said.

Following the Senate vote, the bill now faces a vote in the House, where a companion bill was introduced by Rep. Rick Crawford, R-Ark., and Transportation Committee Chairman Sam Graves, R-Mo. Though, the White House issued a statement ahead of the vote Wednesday saying Biden would veto the bill if passed.

The passage of the resolution also comes shortly after two federal courts ruled in favor of a coalition of more than 20 states and industry groups, and struck down the FHWA regulations.

"The Department of Transportation and Federal Highway Administration remain committed to supporting the Biden-Harris administration’s climate goals of cutting carbon pollution in half by 2030 and achieving net-zero emissions by 2050," an FHWA spokesperson recently told Fox News Digital. "We are reviewing the court’s decision and determining next steps."