In quick succession Thursday morning, President Donald Trump blocked a series of policies across the country promoting electric vehicles, and Washington state joined in a lawsuit attempting to block the move.
Trump signed joint resolutions of Congress on Thursday revoking a series of waivers from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that allowed California to promote increased sales of EVs and the phasing out of internal combustion vehicles in the coming years.
In recent years, Washington and 15 other states, alongside the District of Columbia, crafted their own electric vehicle policies on the foundation of those waivers. So when Trump blocked California’s policy promoting electric vehicles, he also blocked similar policies for all these other states.
Minutes later, California’s Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California Thursday asking for Trump’s actions to be declared unconstitutional. Trump is exerting undue pressure over states’ abilities to craft their own policies, Bonta said in his 42-page complaint.
“The Federal Government ran roughshod over federalism and separation of powers principles” in the way it has revoked these waivers, Bonta said. All despite continued — and nonpartisan warnings — that the actions would be unlawful.
Washington, Colorado, Delaware, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island and Vermont all signed onto the lawsuit as fellow plaintiffs against Trump, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin and the federal government.
How the waivers work
Simply put, in 1967 Congress granted California the ability to set stronger clean air regulations than the federal government. But to enforce each of these rules, the state needs a waiver from the EPA. Other states have long followed suit with California and adopted stricter standards of their own.
California used this system to set targets for increasing sales of EVs, with the goal of phasing out sales of new gas-powered cars entirely by 2035, and Washington set similar standards alongside other states. Commercial vans and trucks must also move toward electric and hybrid options, but Washington’s regulations don’t call for a full ban of gas vehicle sales in those categories.
What did Congress do?
Republicans in the U.S. House and Senate (alongside a few Democrats like Washington’s Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez) used the Congressional Review Act. This allows incoming presidential administrations to revoke regulations enacted by the previous one.
However, officials with the U.S. Government Accountability Office said this spring that these types of waivers aren’t covered by the Congressional Review Act.
Never before had Congress revoked one of California’s waivers.
What happens next?
California’s lawsuit fixates on the Congressional Review Act, arguing that the federal government may not use the law to revoke the waivers. At the same time, Bonta accuses Trump and the other defendants of violating the constitutional separation of powers, echoing a centuries-old warning from a famous French judge and philosopher Montesquieu:
“There can be no liberty where the legislative and executive powers are united in the same body, or person of magistrates.”
Bonta continued: “Put simply, the Federal Government carried out an illegal playbook designed to evade lawful procedures that might prevent the ‘take down’ of disfavored California laws.”
The attorney general asked for the federal judge to declare the congressional resolutions void and reinstate the waivers.
While the court considers this lawsuit, one of many against the Trump administration now mired in the legal process, Washington still has several options to encourage the transition away from gas-powered vehicles.
Lawmakers have said they can try to offer more rebates, expand charging infrastructure or grow access to public transportation.
