Pres. Biden vowed Tuesday to veto a bipartisan Senate-passed resolution blocking his costly rule robbing American consumers of choice by effectively banning natural gas furnaces.
On Tuesday, three Democrat senators and one Independent joined Republicans to pass S.J. 58, which would prevent the Biden Administration from imposing a rule designed to coerce Americans to abandon their gas stoves.
“Today was a win for Texas families, and indeed families across America, who under this rule would be forced to spend thousands of dollars to change their furnaces,” said Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who introduced the resolution, following the 50-45 vote passing the measure.
Energy and Natural Resources Chair Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) voted with 46 Republicans in favor of the resolution.
The rule represents just one of the Biden Administration’s several schemes to rob Americans of critical energy sources, Cruz warns:
“This rule was proposed and finalized by the Biden administration’s Department of Energy as part of a broader, radical campaign against fossil fuels, clean natural gas, and other sources of energy critical to the American economy and American families.”
In response to Biden’s ploys, Republicans have been introducing Congressional Review Act resolutions targeting the administration’s energy efficiency rules for home appliances designed to destroy disfavored industries, by either banning their products outright or making them unaffordable.
In a Senate speech prior to Tuesday’s vote, Cruz explained why Biden’s rule would be devastating to Americans, especially those of modest means:
- “This rule would remove up to sixty percent of current residential furnaces from the market and would impact 55% of American households.”
- “It would force consumers to spend thousands of dollars they don’t have on renovations to accommodate a new gas furnace or to switch to an electric appliance which could mean higher monthly utility bills for families.”
- American consumers “won’t have a choice. The Biden Administration will have made the decision for them.”
- “This rule is a continuation of the Biden Administration’s capitulation to environmental radicals who value following climate dogma more than helping families actually provide for their kids and save for the future.”
- “This administration’s answer to those struggling is that it’s more important to appease the environmental radicals than allowing you to pay your rent, or pay your mortgage or to save for your family or to put money away for your kids in a college fund.”
S.J. 58 “would save American families, and American seniors, thousands and thousands of dollars, as well as save American jobs,” Cruz concluded.
In his statement vowing to veto the resolution, Biden agrees with Cruz, that the administration’s rule is part of a ongoing effort to impose its environmental agenda, boasting that “The DOE residential furnaces standards are part of the Administration’s effort to issue updated standards across several product categories.”
Biden also agrees that his rule will “promote choices for consumers” that the administration favors.
The president’s statement fails to address the high cost of compliance detailed by Sen. Cruz. However, “By one estimate, this rule will heap as much as $4 billion dollars in new costs onto consumers who already can’t afford the high-cost Biden economy,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) noted Wednesday, praising the bipartisan passage of the resolution disapproving of Biden's rule.
And, without explanation, Biden claims that, by depriving Americans of sources of domestic energy, he will, somehow, “strengthen energy security”:
“Passage of S.J. Res. 58 would eliminate these commonsense energy efficiency standards that promote choices for consumers to help them save money, prevent waste of electricity and gas, and strengthen energy security.”
Ironically, on Tuesday, Biden’s Energy Department announced that it will deplete the nation’s strategic reserve by releasing “1 million barrels (42 million gallons) of gasoline in the Northeast Gasoline Supply Reserve (NGSR).”
The move is designed to artificially and temporarily lower the price Americans pay at the pump, without increasing energy production.