Trump Guts Fuel Efficiency Standards & Admits Republicans Don't Want Increased Voter Turnout

Fuel Efficiency Standards. The Trump administration is expected to announce today that it's overturning Obama-era automobile fuel efficiency guidelines as it continues to gut America's plan to combat climate change. It's the clearest signal yet that the administration won't take part in international efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

New York Times: The new rule, written by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Transportation, would allow cars on American roads to emit nearly a billion tons more carbon dioxide over the lifetime of the vehicles than they would have under the Obama standards and hundreds of millions of tons more than will be emitted under standards being implemented in Europe and Asia.

And, for the Trump administration, the fuel efficiency rollback is just one of dozens of policy changes that have weakened the nation's environmental laws.

New York Times: For Mr. Trump, completing the rollback of his predecessor’s climate change policy caps a three-year effort to weaken or undo nearly 100 rules and regulations that had limited industrial pollution of smog, toxic chemicals, greenhouse gases and water contaminants.

Republicans and Voter Turnout. For years Republicans have opposed legislation to make voting easier and their rationale is fairly simple to understand.

Illuminate: ... "Why would anyone want to make it harder to vote? Republicans realized quickly that state measures enacted in the last few decades to making registering and voting easier such as automatic registration, same-day registrations, early voting, and mail-in voting encouraged minorities and the poor to vote."

And voting by mail and online voting encourages young people to cast their ballots in larger numbers.

So, Republicans fought hard to prevent House Democrats from including more funding for absentee and vote by mail provisions in the coronavirus stimulus bill passed last week. Republicans in Congress argued that such provisions weren't related to the fiscal stimulus package, but Donald Trump gave the game away in an interview on Fox News.

Trump on Fox and Friends, Washington Post: “The things they had in there were crazy,” Trump said. “They had things — levels of voting that, if you ever agreed to it, you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.”

Trump isn't the first Republican to admit this recently.

Washington Post: "But Trump isn’t even the only high-ranking national Republican during the 2020 election to reference the idea that higher turnout would hamper the party’s chances. Last year, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) dismissed Democrats’ proposal to make Election Day a federal holiday, suggesting it was intended to help them win elections — apparently by increasing turnout."

So, the next time you are waiting in line to vote on election day, you might want to remember why it isn't easier to cast your ballot.

#news #2020election #environment

By: Don Lam & Curated Content