Press Releases :: June 29, 2007

Miller Amendment Denies Funding for Bush Executive Order

(Washington, DC) The House last night passed legislation that would prevent the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) of the White House from implementing Executive Order 13422 issued by President Bush earlier this year, set to go into full effect July 24, 2007.

House Committee on Science and Technology Investigations and Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Brad Miller (D-NC) and Chair of the Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law Linda Sanchez (D-CA) introduced an amendment which would prohibit the White House Office of Management (OMB) including OIRA from using funds appropriated in this year’s Financial Services Appropriations Act to implement Executive Order 13422.

This action follows two oversight hearings held by Chairman Miller which concluded that under the Bush order, political appointees would be able to dictate health and safety decisions at federal agencies out of the shadows, even if impartial scientific experts decided otherwise. The Subcommittee concluded the Executive order was another avenue for special interests to slow down and prevent agencies from protecting the public.

“This amendment stops the provisions of the order that flagrantly claim for the President the power to rewrite almost every law Congress passes without answering to Congress or the American people,” said Chairman Miller.

The new executive order revised the rules for federal agencies to use a standard of "market failure," which means determining whether private markets can correct a social problem like pollution on their own, before deciding if government should step in. A Bush political appointee in each agency would be empowered to stop agencies from even beginning a move towards regulation.

“Under the Bush order, political appointees could have overruled the professionals at each agency in secret with no accountability to anyone,” said Chairman Miller. “Public safety decisions are supposed to be made in the open, not in closed rooms on the basis of improper political considerations.”

###

110.121