The next step will certainly be a lawsuit
GOP attorneys general push back against SEC climate change disclosure initiative
Two dozen GOP attorneys general wrote to the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday claiming a proposed rule would promote “policy preferences far afield of the Commission’s market-focused domain.”
“This effort reflects agency mission creep of the worst kind,” the attorneys general wrote in their letter objecting to the rule.
The SEC rule in question, known as “The Enhancement and Standardization of Climate-Related Disclosures for Investors,” would force publicly traded companies to disclose how climate change could threaten their businesses and their own contributions to global warming.
“The administration has tried and failed to impose regulation directly, and it now appears content to use back-door financial regulatory actions to implement its political will. But it is up to lawmakers to decide major policy questions like these, not unelected agency administrators,” the Wednesday letter added.
The attorneys general, led by West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, further alleged that, if the rule was finalized, they “expect the Commission will use it as a precedent for asserting many new powers in extra-statutory ways.”
“Freed from any pretense of constraint, the Commission can work to mold the market to its will,” they also said.
The letter was signed by GOP attorneys general from states including West Virginia, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Mississippi, Ohio, South Carolina, Virginia, Wyoming and others.
This is backdoor legislation, which is not authorized by the duly elected Legislative Branch. And it needs to be stopped. Federal agencies need to be reigned in on their over-reach, thinking they can just do whatever the hell they want whenever they want.
