Overnight Regulation: Senate rejects bid to repeal Obama drilling rule

by Lydia Wheeler - 05/10/17 5:05 PM ET

Welcome to Overnight Regulation, your daily rundown of news from the federal agencies, Capitol Hill, the courts and beyond. It’s Wednesday evening here in Washington where the Capitol is abuzz over President Trump’s decision to fire FBI Director James Comey. See where Republican senators stand on the controversial decision here.

THE BIG STORY

The Senate voted down a measure to toss out an Obama-era rule Wednesday that limits the amount of methane emitted in drilling for oil and natural gas.

As The Hill’s Timothy Cama reports, three Republicans – Sens. Lindsey Graham (S.C.), Susan Collins (Maine) and John McCain (Ariz.) – joined all 48 members of the Democrats caucus in rejecting the resolution to repeal the rule under the Congressional Review Act.

Graham and Collins had previously publicized their plans to vote against the legislation. But McCain’s vote came as a surprise.

{mosads}McCain said that he voted against the resolution because he fears that it would have prevented the Bureau of Land Management from writing an improved regulation in the future.

“While I am concerned that the BLM rule may be onerous, passage of the resolution would have prevented the federal government, under any administration, from issuing a rule that is ‘similar,’ according to the plain reading of the Congressional Review Act,” he said in a statement.

“I believe that the public interest is best served if the Interior Department issues a new rule to revise and improve the BLM methane rule.”

The vote marks the first time Republicans have rejected a resolution to repeal an Obama administration regulation since President Trump took office, and came the morning after the president sparked a firestorm with his firing of FBI Director James Comey.

The failure of the resolution is a loss for congressional Republicans, who had targeted the methane rule as one of the main Obama regulations they wanted to reverse. Opponents of the rule argue that it unnecessarily adds costs to oil and natural gas drilling on federal land.

But the defeat of the resolution is a victory for environmentalists, who in recent weeks put up a comprehensive fight to sway vulnerable and moderate senators against repeal.

Find Cama’s full story here.

ON TAP FOR THURSDAY

The Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee will hold a hearing to look at pesticide registrations under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodentcide Act.

The Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee will hold a hearing to look at the status of the housing finance system.

The Senate Judiciary Committee will meet to consider a bill to allow the FBI to use rapid DNA tools and vote on the nomination of Judge Amul Thapar to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.

The Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship will hold a hearing on the nomination of Althea Coetzee to be Deputy Administrator of the Small Business Administration.

TOMORROW’S REGS TODAY

In tomorrow’s edition of the Federal Register:

Drug testing: The Labor Department is officially removing from the regulatory rulebook an Obama-era rule limiting whom states can subject to drug tests for unemployment benefits.

The 2012 rule allowed states to only drug test for unemployment benefits if the person had previously been fired for drug use or worked in a job that regularly drug tests. The Obama rule also specifically listed jobs included under the law, further narrowing its scope.

Congress repealed the rule under the Congressional Review Act, and President Trump signed the resolution into law in March.

Mortgage rules: The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is reviewing the mortgage servicing rules under the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act that was amended under the Dodd Frank Wall Street Reform Law.

The rule requires lenders to make a good faith effort to contact delinquent borrowers by the 36th day of their delinquency and inform the borrower that alternatives to foreclosure may be available. It also prohibits lenders from charging a borrower for it’s own insurance plan when the homeowner’s insurance is cancelled.

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