PREVIOUSLY:

→ Guest article by Fred De Fossard of the Prosperity Institute: "Explained: The Afghan Migrant Scandal And Coverup Shaking Up Britain"

→ Analysis: How The Trump Administration Can Take Over The Ivy League

AND: don't forget to subscribe to the Sphere Podcast on Spotify, YouTube, or Apple Podcasts.

EPA Torches Endangerment Finding

Today, EPA is launching an effort to roll back most automobile regulations, and in particular the so-called "Endangerment Finding" from the Obama Administration in 2009. This regulatory finding, originally issued by the EPA in 2009, determined that greenhouse gases pose a threat to public health and welfare, and therefore allowed the EPA to fold greenhouse gas emissions into its regulatory ambit.

The Endangerment Finding wasn't just an excuse to regulate gas-guzzling cars. It allowed the EPA to potentially regulate literally anything under the Sun, since anything emits carbon.

It's also worth noting what a legal and constitutional travesty it was. It was based on the Clean Air Act, which was passed unanimously in the US Senate and 374-to-1 in the House in 1970, and which aimed to allow the EPA to regulate pollutants. Greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide which cause global warming are not pollutants. They don't give people lung disease or other disease. It may very well be very important to regulate them (and indeed, it is true that climate change is real and a serious threat). But in that case, Congress should pass another Act either doing so or empowering the EPA or some other part of the Executive Branch to do so, because under the Clean Air Act the EPA has no authority to do so.

The idea that an unelected unaccountable agency can self-declare itself to have virtually unlimited powers to fight climate change on the basis of a law passed at a time when nobody knew what climate change was is something out of some sort of Orwellian fantasy.

And then there are the practicalities. Predictably, the Endangerment Finding opened the door to a slew of regulations of dubious value.

The most famous, of course, are the motor vehicle emissions standards, which essentially destroyed the sedan as a car category, driving the industry to produce ever-more less-regulated SUVs and light trucks (which liberals now hate).

But there was a slew of other regulations. There was the "Clean Power Plan" mandate for power plants to reduce "carbon pollution" to 32% below 2005 levels by 2030. There were more stringent standards for new, modified and reconstructed power plants, with separate standards for natural gas-fired turbines and coal-fired steam generating units. There were new methane emissions standards. There was the "Super Emitter Program," that allows third parties, including environmental groups, to detect and report large methane releases from oil and gas sites, which sounds like a boon for litigious NGOs. There was the Reviewed Municipal Solid Waste Landfill Emissions Guidelines. There was the Mandatory Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program. And much, much more.

Our point isn't even that these regulations are all bad, or even that any of them are bad (though probably many are bad). The point is even broader. The point is that this encroaching, neverending rising tide of red tape is what happens when you give unelected bureaucrats some sort of blanket legal authority (or worse, allow them to take it through inaction). These rules were not the result of public debate. They were not part of some grand policy plan to accomplish some important goal for the general welfare.

They happened just because the EPA was there, and it could do it, and the Obama and Biden Administrations looked benignly upon it, and the Trump 1.0 Administration did not have the capacity to do anything about it. They were part of the dross of the 90,402 pages of the Federal register that keeps accumulating.

Oh, and current Acting OIRA Administrator Jeff Clark writes, "Using state-of-the-art revealed-preference economic theory, estimates range from net present value savings to the national economy of $1.7 trillion to $8.2 trillion over the period between 2027 and 2055."

On these grounds, and on all these grounds, each of which would be a sufficient reason on its own, repealing the Endangerment Finding is a very good idea.

Policy News You Need To Know

#Order #Immigration #Crime — Well, whaddaya know? It turns out removing illegal aliens is good for public safety. DHS has made an official announcement that it has found a direct link between falling crime rates and the removal of aliens. “Every single day we are arresting gang members, murderers, pedophiles, and violent predators,” Tricia McLaughlin, DHS assistant secretary said in the statement, adding, “70% of [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] arrests are of illegal aliens who have been convicted or charged with a crime. These arrests and deportations of criminal illegal aliens are having real impact on public safety.”

#Immigration — Speaking of immigration and public order, Andrew R. Arthur at the Center for Immigration Studies has a good piece on the drop in the immigration court backlog. The backlog had grown to more than 4.1 million cases by Inauguration Day, and it has now fallen to just more than 3.8 million. That's a decline of 326,168 immigration court cases in just six months. He points out two interesting and important things in that regard: first, this is symbiotic with border security, as keeping the border secure means no new cases; second, having an efficient, fast-moving immigration court system "is likely more important to the credibility of our immigration system than even our increasingly secure border."

#JudicialTyranny — It happened again. Just The News's Natalia Mittelstadt reports: "Afederal judge on Monday blocked a provision in the Republicans' "One Big Beautiful Bill" that barred Medicaid reimbursements from going to Planned Parenthood. U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston, an Obama appointee, issued a preliminary injunction, saying it was likely unconstitutional to specifically target Planned Parenthood's health centers for punishment for providing abortions" Again, this is the most egregious and indefensible case of this stuff, because this is black-letter law from Congress. If it's unconstitutional for Congress to decide to stop appropriating funds then we are truly in Alice in Wonderland. There needs to be a remedy. Our preferred remedy is for the Supreme Court to declare these judges in contempt so they can be prosecuted by the DOJ.

#AmericanManufacturing #NationalSecurity #Shipbuilding — Interesting article from William Hawkins at the US Naval Institute. As we know, shipbuilding has been a big area of focus for the Administration. There are two goals: economic, and national security. Economic because it provides high-paying manufacturing jobs and is an export industry that reduces the trade deficit. And national security because the US must build more and better ships faster to compete with China. We know this. Well, Hawkins argues that there's a tradeoff. And that if the US wants to meet its national security objectives with regard to building up its Navy, it needs to get help from its allies, and that means giving up on some of the economic goals.

#Chyna — Many national security and economic experts, including many Trump alumni, have signed a letter urging the Administration to stop allowing Nvidia to sell its top-of-the-line H20 chips to China. Doing it “represents a strategic mis-step that endangers the United States’ economic and military edge in artificial intelligence…We urge [Secretary Lutnick] to reverse course.”

#DelendaEstDEI — The Trump administration has launched a civil rights probe into the Duke Law Journal based on reporting (by the invaluable Aaron Sibarium at the Free Beacon) that it used racial criteria in recruiting, and is warning that Duke Medical School could be next. Yes, more, please. Much more.

#Recess — Mike Lee has published a funny tweet calling on the Senate GOP to stay in town in August. Look, we get it. Senators need to get back to their states to meet with their constituents. But we are six months into the Admin, and there really is a pretty big confirmation backlog.

#PublicOrder #Homelessness — Storied Fox News reporter David Marcus has a very good opinion piece at Fox New Digital praising President Trump's approach to homelessness. You will recall we analyzed and praised the new EO on homelessness and public order last Friday.

#FreeSpeech — If the name Douglass Mackey is not familiar to you, he's the Trump supporter who posted a joke meme in 2016 and was arrested and thrown in prison by the Biden Administration for it, in one of the most shocking authoritarian abuses of power in American history. Because America is great, an appeals court eventually released, vindicated, and fully exonerated him. Now, Revolver News reports, he has announced he is launching a civil suit against the US government and has retained heavy legal firepower, namely James Burnham, who previously served as general counsel for DOGE, as well as counsel to the president, the DOJ Civil Rights Division, and the AG’s office. We hope Mackey becomes filthy rich, and we hope the Federal government has to disgorge a settlement the size of which will deter this sort of penny-ante Gestapo crap for the rest of our lifetimes.