Long before Joe Biden was well into his presidential campaign, we started to see a trend that led to him being called the “Gaffe King” by many. Now that he’s in office, another trend is coming into the limelight: writing executive orders. But unlike the first, this one does a lot more than maybe just offend someone or make them question his mental capabilities.
This one is changing the lives of millions.
Take one of his most recent executive orders, EO 13990, for example.
Also known as Executive Order on Protecting Public Health and the Environment and Restoring Science to Tackle the Climate Crisis, the order is basically a massive expansion of federal power on regulating agriculture, energy production, and manufacturing industries throughout the nation.
One such way these new regulations are to be decided is based on the federal government’s determination of the ‘social costs’ of greenhouse gases.
According to section 5 of the executive order, “It is essential that agencies capture the full costs of greenhouse gas emissions as accurately as possible, including by taking global damages into account. Doing so facilitates sound decision-making, recognizes the breadth of climate impacts, and supports the international leadership of the United States on climate issues.”
The order continues, stating that gauging an “accurate social cost is essential for agencies to accurately determine the social benefits of reducing greenhouse gas emissions when conducting cost-benefit analyses of regulatory and other actions.”
To determine the ‘social cost’ for such, the order will put together an “Interagency Working Group on the Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases,” which will be led by the chair for the Council of Economic Advisers, the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, and the director of the Office of Management and Budget.
So what is done once this ‘social cost’ is determined?
Well, it is essentially charged to the American economy as damages from our so-called bad environmental practices and will be exacted via new limitations put on industry and production.
Yes, that’s right. Biden plans to make the American people pay for damages to the environment that greenhouse gases may or may not have caused. And according to the working group’s assessed values so far, the social cost of carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane only already totals a whopping $9.5 trillion.
Luckily, just like with his order on a 100-day deportation freeze, EO 13990 is getting some significant blowback.
As of Monday, 12 states had joined together to file a lawsuit against the Biden administration and this order.
The states and their respective leaders claim the order is nothing short of “unlawful federal overreach.”
Per the suit, the order, if allowed to stand, “will destroy jobs, stifle energy production, strangle America’s energy independence, suppress agriculture, deter innovation, and impoverish working families.”
But more than that, the 12 states, led by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, says that the order “undermines the sovereignty of the States and tears at the fabric of liberty. In practice, President Biden’s order directs federal agencies to use this enormous figure to justify an equally enormous expansion of federal regulatory power that will intrude into every aspect of Americans’ lives.”
The 12 states include Arizona, Arkansas, Indiana, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Utah.
Now one thing you’ll notice is that aside from all being Republican-led states, these are also states that rely heavily upon such industries as manufacturing, agriculture, and energy production.
As Schmitt said in a recent statement, “Manufacturing, agriculture and energy production are essential to Missouri’s economy and employ thousands of hard-working Missourians across the state. Under President Biden’s executive order, which he didn’t have the authority to enact, these hard-working Missourians who have lived and worked this land for generations could be left in the dust.”
He continued, saying, “From higher energy bills to lost jobs, this massive expansion of federal regulatory power has the potential to impact nearly every household in this state – that’s why I’m leading a coalition of states to put a stop to this executive order and protect Missouri families.”
And as a girl from Indiana, I can tell you such an executive order could have a massive negative impact, particularly since, as the suit claims, it could “inflict hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars of damage to the U.S. economy for decades to come.”
As Americans, who have constitutional rights and freedoms, we cannot allow the federal government to grow so large that it stifles our economy, our way of life, or our values. And the sooner Biden learns that, the better.