Interior Sec. Delivers the Good News for Montana Pickup Drivers
The repeal of the Obama era "endangerment finding" was obviously great news for our union coal workers here in Montana, and others in the American energy industry. But it's also great news for those of us who drive pickups. Here's why...
We had an exclusive interview with Trump Interior Secretary and former North Dakota Doug Burgum on Wednesday's "Montana Talks with Aaron Flint" statewide radio show.
The full interview with Secretary Burgum can be found below. We also talked about his recent trip to Yellowstone National Park and America's 250th birthday.
Here's an excerpt from our chat talking about the endangerment finding:
Aaron Flint: "The repeal of the endangerment finding, this is incredible news for Montana and the Rocky Mountain West, in particular in American energy. It's obvious how the repeal of that is good for coal and our folks in oil and gas jobs here in Montana, but for those of us that just like to drive pickups when we're hauling our campers or construction equipment or hauling a boat out to the lake, this is also good news for us. We could save 1000s of dollars on new new pickups now."
Sec. Burgum: "Yeah, absolutely. Aaron...This is- the repeal of the endangerment finding, as it's called, is the single largest red tape cutting action in the history of America. President Trump, Administrator Lee Zeldin from the EPA. I mean, it goes back to Obama. The EPA was never given the authority to try to regulate through just rule making all kinds of things. And they were regulating choice. They were like, Hey, we're going to subsidize EVs, and we're going to regulate internal combustion machines like your favorite pickup or car out of business. And as you say, the estimate is that there's $2,300 in every car that's sold today that is red tape that was created by bureaucrats, not by laws that were passed and, you know, even things like that irritating- sometimes it's called the Obama kill switch. But you know, when you stop at a stop sign, and then the engine shuts off and then starts again, these were regulations that added all kinds of cost to building a car and didn't do anything relative to the so called objectives that they want. You know, we're going to save the planet by regulating internal combustion cars out of business. It's the end of this nonsensical era, the beginning of going back to common sense, and it's going to put dollars back in every consumer's pocket."