Date: April 21, 2025
To: Congress
Re: Oppose CRA Attacks on Clean Air and Public Health
Dear Members of Congress,
We, the undersigned 127 health, business, labor, environmental, consumer, and science organizations urge you to vote NO on Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolutions that aim to overturn Advanced Clean Trucks (“ACT”), Advanced Clean Cars II (“ACC II”), and Heavy-Duty Omnibus (“HDO”) preemption waivers (H.J. Res. 87, H.R. Res. 88, H.J. Res. 89). These critical clean air standards, previously granted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), are essential for reducing toxic air pollution, protecting public health, and cutting climate-damaging emissions.
If successful, these CRA resolutions would mark the first time in the more than half-century of the Clean Air Act that Congress has attempted to take away states’ rights to choose clean vehicle standards to protect their citizens from dangerous air pollution. Using the CRA on these standards is an unprecedented and reckless attack on state sovereignty and allows EPA to avoid any accountability by bypassing explaining and defending its action to the public and the courts. Furthermore, improperly applying the CRA would open up a Pandora's box, creating a precedent for future attempts to apply the CRA to any number of executive actions outside its scope, from approval for Medicaid waivers to changes to K-12 education plans.
If Congress overrides these state standards, people across the country will face severe health, economic, and environmental consequences:
1. Hurting Consumers at the Pump. Blocking these standards will cost consumers more than $89 billion in fuel savings through 2040 – more than $55 billion in net costs, taking into account purchase prices. These standards are key to accelerating the domestic supply chain for battery manufacturing and moving us closer to a sustainable model of battery recycling
2. Harming Air Quality and Health: More than 131 million people live in counties with unhealthy levels of ozone or particulate pollution, according to the American Lung Association. Cars, SUVs, and trucks are the single largest source of ozone-forming emissions and a significant source of fine particulate pollution, which causes asthma attacks, heart attacks and strokes, premature births, lung cancer, and premature deaths. The standards that these CRA resolutions aim to block are essential to curb this pollution and protect the millions of vulnerable people who live in these counties. Preventing enforcement of these rules would allow more than 1,500,000 metric tons of NOx, 17,700 metric tons of fine particles, and 1.6 billion metric tons of climate-harming emissions to be spewed into the air. More pollution means more children suffering asthma attacks and missing school, more grandparents dying prematurely, and more death and destruction from extreme weather.
3. Ceding Global Leadership to Other Countries: Businesses require certainty for investments in clean transportation. These CRAs will kneecap companies that are investing billions of public and private sector dollars in new job-creating factories – primarily in areas like North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Michigan, and Arizona. U.S. companies led the world auto industry for a century, and they should be leading the global clean vehicle transition now underway. These CRAs will only leave domestic manufacturing behind.
Congress should leave this issue to the states, which are free at any time to change course and go back to federal standards. We urge Congress to oppose these attacks to our air and public health and vote NO on H.J. Res. 87, H.R. Res. 88, H.J. Res. 89.
Signed,
350 Chicago
350 Mass
ACEEE ACQ (Ask the Climate Question)
Acterra: Action for a Healthy Planet
Advanced Energy United
AFT New Jersey
All Our Energy
Alliance for Clean Energy New York
Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments
Breathe Southern California
C40 Cities
California Communities Against Toxics
California Electric Transportation Coalition
California Environmental Voters
Californians Against Waste
Catskill Mountainkeeper
Center for Biological Diversity
Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice (CCAEJ)
Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment
Central California Asthma Collaborative
Change the Chamber
Chesapeake Climate Action Network
Citizens Campaign for the Environment
Clark County Clean Air
Clean Water Action
Climate Action Campaign
Climate Action PA
Climate Reality Greater Maryland
Climate Reality Project, Chicago
Climate Solutions
Coalition for Clean Affordable Energy
Coalition for Clean Air
Coltura Communities for a Healthy Bay
Conservation Law Foundation
Conservation Voters New Mexico
CWA Local 1036
Dayenu: A Jewish Call to Climate Action
Do Good LLC
Douglas County Global Warming Coalition
Duwamish River Community Coalition
E2
Earthjustice Action
Ecology Action
Ecology Center
Elders Action Network
Elders Climate Action
Elders Climate Action Maryland
Elected Officials to Protect America
Electric Vehicle Association
Endangered Species Coalition
Environment California
Environmental Advocates NY
Environmental Defense Action Fund
Environmental Health Coalition
Environmental Law & Policy Center
Evergreen Action
FACTS Families Advocating for Chemical AND Toxics Safety
For the Many Forth Fresh Energy (MN)
Generation180
Green Energy Consumers Alliance
GreenLatinos
Health & Medicine Policy Research Group
Health Care Without Harm
HPAE
Illinois Clinicians for Climate Action
Illinois Environmental Council
Labor Network for Sustainability
Latino Outdoors
League of Conservation Voters (LCV)
Long Island Progressive Coalition
MA Mothers Out Front
Maryland LCV
Mass. Peace Action
Metro East Green Alliance
Michigan League of Conservation Voters
Mobilizing Climate Action Together (MCAT), Transportation Committee
Moms Clean Air Force
Mothers Out Front
Mountain Mamas
National Consumer Law Center, on behalf of our low-income clients
National Consumers League
National Environmental Health Association
National Wildlife Federation NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council)
Neighborhood Sun Neighbors for Clean Air
New Jersey League of Conservation Voters
New Jersey Policy Perspective
New Mexico & El Paso Region Interfaith Power and Light
New Yorkers for Clean Power
NJ Work Environment Council
NW Energy Coalition
Oregon Environmental Council
Oregon League of Conservation Voters
Peoples Collective for Environmental Justice
Physicians for Social Responsibility
Plug In America
Project Green Home
Prosperity Works
Public Citizen
Regional Asthma Management & Prevention (RAMP)
Regional Plan Association
Respiratory Health Association
ReVision Energy Inc.
RiSE
SanDiego350
Sierra Club
SJV Medical Advocates for Healthy Air
Southern Environmental Law Center
Southwest Energy Efficiency Project
Sustainable Energy Inc.
The Climate Mobilization, Montgomery County MD
The Greenlining Institute
The Legacy of a Livable Planet
Together for Brothers
Tri-State Transportation Campaign
Union of Concerned Scientists
Unitarian Universalist Advocacy Network of Illinois
Verde
Voices for Progress
Washington Conservation Action
Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility
WE ACT for Environmental Justice