Politics

Sen. Inhofe warns of unfettered EPA in second Obama term

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One of the Senate’s most vocal critics of President Barack Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency will release a report Thursday about what he warns will be a series of onerous regulations the agency plans to impose on American taxpayers after the November election.

“In all these [presidential] debates the thing they overlook and don’t talk about is just as important as servicing another $5 trillion of indebtedness, is all these rules and regulations,” Oklahoma Republican Sen. James Inhofe told The Daily Caller about a potentially uninhibited EPA in Obama’s second term.

“Now some we’ve killed, some have passed. But this [report] is the list of the ones that [the administration] is leaving until after the election.”

Inhofe’s report focuses on the Obama administration’s commitment to what Inhofe considers a “far left green agenda,” and on how that agenda will inform the EPA’s rulemaking and enforcement strategy during a second Obama term. (RELATED: Inhofe to investigate EPA official’s ‘crucify them’ approach to oil and gas companies)

“[I]t’s pretty clear that if President Obama secures a second term, the Obama-EPA will have a very busy next four years, moving full speed ahead to implement numerous major rules and regulations that he has delayed or punted due to the upcoming election,” the report reads, alleging that 13 specific potential EPA rules and regulations “will strangle economic growth, destroy millions of jobs, and dramatically raise the price of goods, the cost of electricity, and the price of gas.”

According to the senator, Obama has moved more to the center with his rhetoric on environmental regulations and away from the far left environmental movement to appeal to voters who are concerned about the economy and their pocketbooks.

But during a “second term, he’s made the commitment” to moving his environmental policy back to the left, Inhofe said.

“They are all jumping on him. All the Al Gore people, the elites, the MoveOn.orgs, saying, ‘You had control of the House and the Senate you still didn’t do it.’ And he says ‘wait until I get past this election and then I’ll do it.’”

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