US House Votes To Curtail EPA’s Use Of Science

The Hill reports:

The House voted Wednesday to restrict the kind of scientific studies and data that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can use to justify new regulations. The Honest and Open New EPA Science Treatment Act, or HONEST Act, passed 228-194. It would prohibit the EPA from writing any regulation that uses science that is not publicly available.

It’s the latest push by House Republicans to clamp down on what they say has turned into an out-of-control administrative state that enforces expensive, unworkable regulations that are not scientifically sound. Even with President Trump in the White House, the GOP feels it’s important to make lasting changes to how regulations are written and justified.

“This legislation ensures that sound science is the basis for EPA decisions and regulatory actions,” Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), chairman of the Science Committee, said on the House floor Wednesday. “The days of ‘trust-me’ science are over. In our modern information age, federal regulations should be based only on data that is available for every American to see and that can be subjected to independent review,” he said. “That’s called the scientific method.”

Rep. Lamar Smith, the bill’s author, is a Christian Scientist, the sect regularly in the news for killing their children by denying them medical treatment in lieu of healing by White Jesus.