* Last week…
The Senate voted on Thursday to block California’s first-in-the nation rule banning the sale of new gas-powered cars by 2035, moving to kill the country’s most aggressive effort to transition toward electric vehicles as President Donald Trump’s administration has doubled down on fossil fuels.
The measure overturning the rule now goes to the White House, where Trump is expected to sign it, along with two other resolutions that would block California rules curbing tailpipe emissions in certain vehicles and smog-forming nitrogen oxide pollution from trucks. All three measures were approved by the Senate on Thursday and by the House earlier this month.
* Wonky bit…
At the heart of the controversy is whether the air pollution waiver that the EPA granted to California last year qualifies as a “rule” under the [1996 Congressional Review Act]. Both the Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan oversight agency, and the Senate parliamentarian, a nonpartisan appointee tasked with interpreting congressional rules and procedures, issued advisory opinions earlier this year saying that it doesn’t. Republican Senator Mike Lee of Utah appeared to agree with this interpretation: A one-pager on a bill he proposed to repeal California’s waiver said that the exemptions “cannot be reviewed under the Congressional Review Act because the waiver granted by EPA is not a rule as that term is defined in the CRA.”
The Senate essentially overruled its parliamentarian.
* What the wonky bit means…
California has already announced that it will sue to maintain its waiver, charging that the Senate had no authority to overturn it. But the Senate operates largely on precedent, and now that the parliamentarian has been disregarded on this point, virtually any action the executive branch takes could be construed as a rule, and therefore subject to fast-track congressional review.
For this reason, Democrats could subject the Senate to time-consuming resolution votes repeatedly, to such a degree that the Senate would not have time to do anything else for the rest of this session of Congress. In other words, Democrats could respond to the waiver vote by paralyzing the Senate, and stopping the giant Trump tax bill from ever reaching the floor.
* I sent that story to Sen. Tammy Duckworth’s office and asked for a comment…
Senator Duckworth has made clear she is ready and eager to use all possible levers in the Senate to prevent Trump and Republicans from enacting their agenda that will devastate middle-class Americans.
That said, what Republicans showed with bypassing the Parliamentarian is that they are willing to change the rules whenever, and however, it best suits them.
So while this option could be effective, the Senator is under no illusions that so long as Senate Republicans remain unified in their willingness to be little more than a spineless conference of rubberstamps for Donald Trump, Republicans will not hesitate to simply change the rules again.
We’ll see if she does something.
- hmmm - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:07 pm:
Somthing is better than nothing.
Thanks Sen Duckworth
- @misterjayem - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:17 pm:
“it may not work”
True, but in the immortal words of Michael Scott:
– MrJM
- Kristen - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:17 pm:
There goes the Elon Musk is running everything argument.
- NIU Grad - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:20 pm:
This goes to the core of general apathy of Democratic voters: When the Republicans are in charge, they are able to bypass everything to get their agenda done. When the Democrats are in power, they never seem to bypass the parliamentary trickery of the Republicans.
- Grandson of Man - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:23 pm:
“they are willing to change the rules whenever, and however, it best suits them”
Democrats warned voters about this and are not responsible. Now certainly voters are going to be reasonable and not yell at them to fix it, especially the ones who either went against them or didn’t vote? Democrats should hang up a sign: Constituent services only. You broke it again, you fix it this time. /s
- Chicagonk - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:27 pm:
EV mandates don’t poll well, so I would imagine a lot of Senators aren’t going to fight too hard on this.
- Rich Miller - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:28 pm:
===EV mandates don’t poll well===
What the heck does that have to do with it? This isn’t about what just happened. It’s about what could happen.
People need to stop automatically reguritating their DC talking points in lieu of actual reading comprehension.
- ugh - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:31 pm:
and this is why Democrats fail in DC. We didn’t elect you to sit back and do nothing.
- Streator Curmudgeon - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:47 pm:
“…a spineless conference of rubberstamps…”
Nice turn of phrase.
Those invertebrates are salivating to get that Big Beautiful Tax Cuts for the Rich Bill passed, so there might be room for negotiation. If the ultra-conservatives hold out, the GOP would need Democrat votes to pass that turkey.
Bad idea for the Dems to support cuts to Medicaid. I can’t see Senator Duckworth backing that.
- Give Us Barrabbas - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:53 pm:
I’m repeating something I have said before: if they are too afraid of losing their jobs to actually do their jobs, they shouldn’t have that job in the first place.
- lake county democrat - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 1:53 pm:
On a related note, we’re going to hit the 1.5 degree increase threshhold in 2 years (less than a decade ago, the prediction was 15 years): https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2025/05/29/15degrees-celsius-world-meteorological-organization/
- TheInvisibleMan - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 2:03 pm:
To paraphrase a wise man from the end of the last century - “you don’t need to be in the Senate to do nothing, my cousin isn’t in the Senate and he does nothing all day.”
They might ignore the rules, so I’m probably not going to do anything - is just a terrible response.
“they are willing to change the rules whenever, and however, it best suits them”
Well, yeah. We’ve been playing Calvinball since at least 2001. Meanwhile Ds are complaining about the rules of checkers. That’s great and all, but it’s not actually accomplishing anything. Stop being a doormat.
- SpiDem - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 2:08 pm:
It is absolutely amazing the extent to which the Dems just sit back and watch the GOP shred the norms and simply respond by wringing their hands.
There are so many ways to gum up the Senate. Take some initiative and play some hardball for once!
- GoneFishing - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 2:14 pm:
Part of the problem is voters are frustrated that things cannot get done. They elect Trump who promises to get things done, bypassing congress. Makes Trump supporters happy. Makes everone else less happy. This is the problem with a representative democracy. Voters turn up to vote for a president to fix it. However they forget the founding fathers really didn’t want that and on purpose divided the government. I guess the founding fathers where afraid of rule by the mob. It is all explained in the Federalist Papers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federalist_No._10
- Earnest - Thursday, May 29, 25 @ 2:29 pm:
Senator Duckworth has made clear she is ready and eager to use all possible levers in the Senate to prevent Trump and Republicans from enacting their agenda that will devastate middle-class Americans.
-I’ll believe that when I see it in action.
- Odysseus - Friday, May 30, 25 @ 1:26 am:
“she is ready and eager to use all possible levers in the Senate”
Does that include denying unanimous consent?
Democrats literally do not even do the smallest thing.