LANSING – A decision by President Barack Obama to order fast action on new rules requiring the automotive industry to meet tighter pollution and mileage standards, and to potentially allow individual states to set higher standards than the federal government, was more respectfully greeted by Michigan Democrats than Republicans, but the message was the same from both parties – the industry must have a national standard and not individual state standards.
Republicans more strongly criticized the move, however, as potentially devastating to jobs in the state.
The action by Obama reverses a decision by the administration of former President George W. Bush to maintain a single national standard on pollution and mileage. The effort to impose state specific standards, led by California, is seen by supporters as a boost towards controlling global warming.
Obama said it is also part of his campaign pledge to pull the United States away from its dependence on foreign oil.
He said the administration would step up efforts to ensure the auto industry is not hurt by the move.
U.S. Sen. Carl Levin (D-Detroit) was the most publicly skeptical among state Democrats on the move. Saying he had been assured the EPA would not start its review with a “foregone conclusion” of the rules that would deal with pollution standards.
“I sure hope that is true, because a separate California standard will not only create the ‘confusing and patchwork set of standards’ that President Obama today implied he wanted to avoid, but also, as the California standard is currently drafted, it is discriminatory against U.S.-made vehicles of the same efficiency as the imports,” Levin said.
Governor Jennifer Granholm said that while she supported the goal of cutting the national dependence on foreign oil, “I urge the president and his Environmental Protection Agency to develop a strong, national standard for vehicle emissions rather than a patchwork of state standards. A strong, single standard will help drive automotive innovation, ensure certainty for businesses operating under those standards, create new jobs, and protect the environment and at the same time ensure that we give the auto manufacturers a clear goal to meet as they work to retool and focus on producing advanced technology vehicles like the Chevy Volt.”
U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Lansing) said she has strongly pushed for new efforts for the industry to meet new standards through financing efforts. The new national fuel economy standards are already a tough regulation and the country should use one standard for the entire industry, she said.
U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Brighton) said the decision would simply kill jobs in Michigan and make it tougher for the domestic industry to compete. It represented a “cruel blow” to working families in the state, he said.
And in several interviews Attorney General Mike Cox repeated the criticism he had leveled a week ago against allowing for separate state standards.
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