Michael Regan is one step closer to confirmation as President Biden’s top environment official, after bipartisan approval by a Senate panel.
The Senate Environment Committee voted 14-6 on Tuesday to approve Regan’s nomination as Environmental Protection Agency administrator. However, six Republicans voted against Regan, raising concerns that he hadn’t committed to implementing policies different from Biden’s aggressive climate agenda or Obama-era emissions mandates.
“As an individual, he is absolutely the type of person that I would like to see leading a federal agency,” said Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, the top Republican on the committee. She praised Regan for being an “accessible” regulator during his time as North Carolina’s environment chief.
“Unfortunately, officials in place at the White House and at the EPA have already set the agenda before he achieves the office,” Capito said. “It is unclear whether Secretary Regan, if confirmed, would have any authority or have the authority to stop the regulatory march towards the Green New Deal.”
GOP Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma echoed Capito’s comments, saying he was voting against Regan’s nomination despite him being an “unquestionably qualified individual.”
A handful of Republican senators took this same approach in the Senate Energy Committee when voting on Biden’s nominee for energy secretary: Jennifer Granholm. The top Republican on that panel, Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, and others rejected Granholm’s nomination to protest Biden’s executive actions pausing oil and gas leasing on federal lands and canceling the Keystone XL pipeline.
Regan generally received a positive reaction from Republican senators on the committee during his confirmation hearing on Feb. 3, even from those who were critical of Biden’s executive actions on climate change. Several of the Republicans who had tough questions for Regan about Biden’s climate policies during the hearing, such as Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan, voted to approve his nomination.
However, it’s not clear when Regan’s nomination will see a vote on the floor, as impeachment proceedings against former President Donald Trump begin later Tuesday in the Senate.
In response to the Republican members’ comments, Sen. Tom Carper, the Delaware Democrat leading the committee, said he has already been talking with Capito and West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, who chairs the Energy Committee, about policies to boost job creation in the coal-heavy state.
“It’s very sad to go there and see what has happened to the economy,” Carper said. He added that he is working with former Pennsylvania Rep. Charlie Dent, recently appointed the Aspen Institute’s congressional arm, to host a workshop in West Virginia in the spring focused on “what kind of jobs can be created for the people whose jobs have been displaced.”
