There's a new obstacle in California's bid to have stricter motor vehicle emission requirements than the rest of the country. Los Angeles Congressman Henry Waxman says the White House is illegally lobbying the Environmental Protection Agency to deny California's permit request for a waiver under the Clean Air act. Jodi Breisler reports from Capitol Hill.
California first asked to be allowed to impose higher greenhouse gas emissions standards on cars in December of 2005.
Democrat Waxman is the chair of the House oversight committee. He says Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters has been secretly lobbying the EPA to deny California stricter pollution standards.
Waxman : For her to work with people at the Council for Environmental Quality and the White House and maybe even surreptitiously with the head of the EPA itself who has already said he was going to base this case on the merits, it would show such hypocrisy and such disregard for the law -- it's shocking and shouldn't be permitted.
Waxman says the Clean Air Act gives California the right to apply for permission to heighten standards and all comments on the case should be made on the public record. He sent a letter of complaint to the White House's Council on Environmental Quality and is still waiting for a response.
From Washington, I'm Jodi Breisler for KPBS radio.
