{"id":5293,"date":"2016-05-26T16:48:09","date_gmt":"2016-05-26T21:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/?p=5293"},"modified":"2024-02-12T11:01:50","modified_gmt":"2024-02-12T16:01:50","slug":"tsca-reform-on-hold-again-and-over-what-this-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/2016\/05\/26\/tsca-reform-on-hold-again-and-over-what-this-time\/","title":{"rendered":"TSCA reform on hold again \u2013 and over what this time?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Richard Denison, Ph.D.,\u00a0<\/em>is a Lead Senior Scientist.<\/p>\n<p>Well, it looks like American families will have to wait a bit longer for better protection from toxic chemicals, with <a href=\"http:\/\/tscatodaybna.wpengine.com\/?p=248\">today\u2019s decision by Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) to place a hold<\/a> on the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act.\u00a0 Earlier this week, the House passed the legislation by a vote of 403-12, and it was due to come to Senate floor today \u2013 until Sen. Paul announced his hold.<\/p>\n<p>Arguing that he needed more time to review the bill, Sen. Paul cited brand new concerns over two provisions that were already in the Senate bill when it came to the Senate floor last December by unanimous consent and passed on a voice vote with no objections.\u00a0 Those provisions <a href=\"http:\/\/tscatodaybna.wpengine.com\/?p=250\">involve criminal penalties and state preemption<\/a>.\u00a0 Let\u2019s look at each: \u00a0<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><strong style=\"line-height: 1.5\">Criminal penalties<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Existing TSCA already has criminal penalties for knowing and willful violations of the Act.\u00a0 The bill makes two changes \u2013 BOTH of them added to make TSCA consistent with other federal environmental laws:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>It raises the maximum fine from $25,000 to $50,000 per day for knowing and willful violations of the Act.<\/li>\n<li>It adds a provision that provides for higher fines or imprisonment for anyone who <strong><em>knowingly and willfully puts an individual in imminent danger of death or serious bodily injury<\/em><\/strong>. This provision is virtually verbatim taken from other major Federal environmental laws, including the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Sen. Paul objects to this provision because, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=3qnfZfAY980\">according to his floor statement <\/a>today, \u201cit involves new criminalization, new crimes that will be created at the federal level.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, he apparently objects to subjecting someone who deliberately \u201cplaces an individual in imminent danger of death or serious bodily injury\u201d to criminal penalties.<\/p>\n<p><strong>State preemption<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Sen. Paul also apparently objects to the bill\u2019s provisions that place limits on states\u2019 authority in regulating chemicals, which has been, of course, a very contentious part of the debate over TSCA reform.\u00a0 The bill would, under certain circumstances, not allow states to impose restrictions on a chemical that are <em>more stringent<\/em> than the Federal government has imposed; see <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-content\/blogs.dir\/11\/files\/2016\/05\/Preemption-under-FRL21-5-23-16-final.pdf\">here <\/a>for more detail about preemption under the bill.<\/p>\n<p>But unlike, for example, the nine House Democrats who voted against the bill because of its preemption, Sen. Paul\u2019s concern is about states being told they can\u2019t do <em>less<\/em> than the Federal government when it comes to controlling pollution or restricting chemicals. \u00a0\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=3qnfZfAY980\">According to his floor statement <\/a>today, he objects to the bill because \u201cit includes preemption of states \u2013 it includes a new federal regime which would basically supersede regulations <em>or lack of regulations<\/em> in Louisiana or Texas or Oklahoma&#8221; (emphasis added).\u00a0 Lest there be any doubt about his meaning, Paul goes on in his statement to decry Federal <em>over<\/em>-regulation.<\/p>\n<p>Sen. Paul\u2019s positions would seem to be wholly at odds with the consensus reflected in the Lautenberg Act on the need for a more effective and stronger, not weaker, Federal chemical safety system.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Richard Denison, Ph.D.,\u00a0is a Lead Senior Scientist. Well, it looks like American families will have to wait a bit longer for better protection from toxic chemicals, with today\u2019s decision by Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) to place a hold on the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act.\u00a0 Earlier this week, the House &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":100,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44,114108],"tags":[56107],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-5293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-policy","category-tsca","tag-lautenberg-act"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5293","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/100"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5293"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5293\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12767,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5293\/revisions\/12767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5293"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=5293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}