ANALYSIS/OPINION:
The New York Times on Aug. 24, 2014, broke a major news story: “Obama pushing Climate Accord in Lieu of Treaty.” It’s a clumsy headline — no one dared claim the Kyoto Protocol was anything other than a treaty requiring Senate ratification, and even the Grey Lady calls it the “Kyoto Accord.” What the story revealed, however, was shocking news indeed, made more shocking by an email just revealed by the State Department in Freedom of Information Act litigation.
This email, obtained by the Energy and Environment Legal Institute, further calls into question the Senate’s failure to confront President Obama over his usurpation of the body’s constitutional treaty function through the Paris climate agreement.
It also stokes concerns whether the institution will reclaim its powers, as appears will be necessary in order to make good on President Trump’s announced plan to withdraw from Paris.
The Times story’s key passage:
“In seeking to go around Congress to push his international climate change agenda, Mr. Obama is echoing his domestic climate strategy. In June, he bypassed Congress and used his executive authority to order a far-reaching regulation forcing American coal-fired power plants to curb their carbon emissions. The Obama administration’s international climate strategy is likely to infuriate Republican lawmakers who already say the president is abusing his executive authority by pushing through major policies without congressional approval.”
Mr. Obama jammed those EPA rules through by executive fiat, after a Democrat-led Congress killed legislation to grant the authority he then claimed to already possess; the Supreme Court put the rules on ice upon challenge by a majority of states. The Paris climate agreement, however, unilaterally imposed on Mr. Obama’s way out the door, would be “a treaty that was going to last until the end of the century.”
