Trump Revokes California’s Power Over Emissions

Supreme Court. At a news conference, California's governor and attorney general vow to fight the Trump administration in court. Joining me now is Michael Gerard, Professor Columbia Law School and director of the Saventh Center for Climate Change Law. Professor, California has been setting a stricter standard for emissions for many years. Will you explain the waiver they're operating under

and what's at stake here? So? The Clean Air Act of ural government sets the vehicle emission standards and greenhouse gas standards nationwide. But they Congress let California set its own um tougher standard if E p. A gave him a waiver to do that. So E p A has always given a waiver to California until now. Now they're

taking it away for the first time. So the A. G. Javier bass Era has said that they will sue nothing new for his office suing over Obama era environmental regulations, but can you envision what the grounds for their lawsuit would be. Well, the Trump administration so far has compiled a pretty poor record in the way it goes about trying to provoke regulations, and many of the attempts that they have made have failed. Um, there is no precedent

for revoking a waiver. The reasons that they seem to be given are that they have recalculated the costs and benefits of greenhouse gasses UM and there are a whole lot of technical questions about the way that they have on that. It's also clear that one impact of this revocation, if it survives in court, is very is much higher not only greenhouse gas emissions, but also much higher fuel expenditures for drivers because it's going to mean that the cars are going to be driving will be consuming a

lot more gasoline per gallant per per mile. Well, at the press conference, that was one thing that they seemed to be hitting on that this was a better choice for consumers, and also that the car industry was on board with it. Well. Ford, Honda, Lukswagen, and BMW have all signed in agreement with the state of California saying that regardless of what the federal government does, they're going to go ahead and uh and sell the cleaner, more

fuel efficient cars. One of the things that they said is that they didn't have to bend twist arms to get the automakers that you mentioned to come on board, that they were looking to the future and what they saw ahead. That's right. The auto industry is very eager to have to just make one kind of car. Um They don't like the idea of having to make different cars for different states. And they realize that stricter fuel

economy standards are are coming down the road. We know that if the administration changes after the next election, the next administration will call for stronger standards. So these these four companies, as I said, want the cleaner car standards. And what's your opinion of the antitrust investigation that the Justice Department recently opened into that deal between California and

the four automakers. It's hard to envision that as being anything other than the President's annoyance at California, UM I haven't seen any coherent anti trust theory for what why what they're doing is a violation of anything and the uh they're they're doing it with an agreement with the government and that makes them enjoy certain immunities. The California a g said the lawsuit would depend on what they're

actually doing. At the e p A, they're going to revoke their waiver, and it also is their involvement of the Transportation Authority as well. It's really confusing. Yeah, The Environmental Protection Agency says the greenhouse gas emission standards. The National Highway Transportation Safety Board, which is part of the Department of Transportation, says that full economy standards. They're very

closely linked and they were tied together. So the only thing official we have so far is the president's tweet when they published the formal notice in the Federal Register. Will see exactly what they're doing, But it sounds like that both these agencies, the Transportation Department and EPA, are going to be taking action. Mary Nichols, who's the head of California's Air Resources Board, said at this is more

than just about setting emission standards. It's also about the health of California's residents and that this is not taking that into consideration, that it's more than just climate change. That's exactly right, because the same combustion of gasoline that generates greenhouse gases also generates carbon monoxide and nitrous oxides and other plutents that are unhealthy. So Andrew Wheeler and the e p A said that what they want to have is one national standard for all tail pipe pollution.

Is that something that would actually be good for the country to have one standard? Yes, and that is exactly what we have now. The agreement that was struck between the auto industry and e p A and also with California on board in two thousand and ten, was for one national standard that would aggressively tighten through. The administration is now also talking about trying to kill that deal, but just a continuation of the of the existing rules

would be one national standard. And again at the press conference, the governor of California query, what is this for. It's not good for consumers, that the automakers don't want it. Who wants it? So that's my question to you, what's the reason for going backward? In time. Basically, well, the only clear beneficiaries the oil industry, because if you have more gas guzzline cars, that means they buy more gasoline. This is pitting California once again against the Trump administration.

They have sued the Trump administration more than fifty times. That's more than any other states. Certainly a lot of the times on environmental issues. Is there also and did we see this in the antitrust suit that was brought? Is there also just this conflict between the Trump administration and California that persists. I yes, but it's not only California. UM. Twelve other states, for example, have joined with California and uh historically in getting using the waiver and having more

fuel efficient cars. Uh. Several of those states, maybe all of them are going to join with California. There are many other states that are frequently joining with California or on their own UM suing the Trump administration. So it's not just that one state. So I want to read you President Trump's tweet and get your reaction. The Trump administration is revoking California's federal waiver on emissions in order to produce far less expensive cars for the consumer. While

at the same time making the cars substantially safer. This will lead to more production because of this pricing and safety. Is that factually true? No? I mean the safety argument is really um is really focus and that has been refuted several times when they first floated it. And as I said, that's not good for consumers either because in the long terminal means that it'll mean that the operation

of the car costs much more. The California A G said, we want to see the facts and the science together with their change and the rules here with the Trump administration change has that been one of the winning arguments for California and some of these environmental suits that the science doesn't support what the Trump administration is doing. Yeah. The Trump administration, of course denies that climate change is mostly caused by humans and as having very adverse effects.

The courts are not buying it. Not a single court has embraced the climate denial that we hear from the Trump administration. And the administration also has not been very careful about following the necessary administered procedures. Who on both counts that they usually lose. Thank you so much for coming on today, professor. That's Michael Gerard is a professor Columbia Law School and director of the SAVEN Center for Climate Change Law. We hook you'll join us again. Thanks

for listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and on bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brosso. This is Bloomberg