Barrasso: Clean Power Plan Is a National Energy Tax

(CNSNews) - "The president yesterday did another end-run around Congress and an end-run around the American people with his climate regulations," Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) told a news conference on Tuesday.

He noted that President Obama "couldn't get this sort of thing passed" even when he had a Democrat-majority Congress in his first term. "Why?" Barrasso asked. "Well, because it's a national energy tax, and people don't like it. They don't like it to the fact that 32 states have come out against what the president in his proposal."

Barrasso said the Clean Power Plan produced by the Environmental Protection Agency and endorsed by Obama on Monday will reduce energy reliability, jobs, and economic growth.

"As you're talking to people, find the families that really love paying their utility bill now and want to pay even more. I think you're going to have a hard time finding those families," Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) told the same news conference.

He said the carbon reduction plan Obama announced on Monday "will have the impact of raising utility bills and it'll have disproportionate impact on poor families and working families and middle class families that can barely pay their utility bill now.Local utilities pass along their costs to consumers, Blunt noted.

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