State Attorney General John M. Formella is touting a victory over a Security and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) mandate that would force businesses to track and report greenhouse gas emissions. New Hampshire was one of 25 states to challenge the controversial rule, which would require businesses to disclose information about their carbon emissions and document their spending on climate-related effects.
The attorneys general won a temporary, nationwide block on what they call “Biden’s extreme climate mandate” while the lawsuit continues.
“This SEC overreach would significantly hurt businesses here in New Hampshire and across our country by devastating the supply chain and imposing costly red tape. This goes well beyond the commission’s important mandate: protecting American investors from fraud and protecting the financial integrity of our nation’s security exchanges,” Formella said in a statement. “The SEC knows it has completely overstepped its bounds here, as the rule far exceeds the agency’s statutory authority, is not in accordance with the law, and would negatively impact our economy.”
And, Formella added, the SEC doesn’t have the power to create such a far-reaching mandate that will cost U.S. businesses billions of dollars a year.
The proposed rule has been controversial since the Biden administration first proposed it. At the time, the lone Republican on the commission, Hester Peirce, said the agency was overreaching. “We are not the Securities and Environment Commission,” she wrote.
President Joe Biden has been very aggressive on climate policy, spending hundreds of billions of dollars on subsidies and shutting down the Keystone XL pipeline. Over that same period, the average national gasoline price has risen more than 40 percent, from $2.39/gallon to $3.42/gallon.
At the same time, Biden has failed to meet some of his basic benchmarks for a green transition.
For example, Biden has vowed to build 500,000 EV charging stations across the U.S. by 2030. More than $7.5 billion has been appropriated. But over the past two years, just seven stations in four states have been built.
Critics say the Biden administration is attempting to use regulatory power to impose policies the public won’t accept, businesses don’t want, and Congress can’t pass.
“The states make the case that the SEC cannot implement the climate mandate without an act of Congress. This is just the most recent example of the federal government going too far to force a radical green scheme,” Formella said.
