Posted on 10/28/2003 7:47:51 AM PST by The_Victor
WASHINGTON -- Senate Democrats, facing an overwhelming vote against them, dropped their opposition Monday to Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt as head of the Environmental Protection Agency.
Minutes before the Senate was to have held a procedural vote that would have ordered an up-or-down decision soon on Leavitt's confirmation, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., said the White House had satisfied her demands.
Clinton and the Senate's three Democratic presidential contenders -- Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, John Kerry of Massachusetts and John Edwards of North Carolina -- led an effort for weeks to block a vote on Leavitt, protesting Bush administration environmental policies.
Senators now plan to vote on Leavitt's nomination today after an hour's debate.
Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., who chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said Leavitt deserved speedy confirmation.
"Those who have worked with Gov. Leavitt hold him in the highest regard," Inhofe said.
"We need a leader at the agency," echoed Sen. Jim Jeffords, I-Vt., who preceded Inhofe as environment committee chairman. A spokesman for Jeffords, who urged holding up the nomination to get more information about EPA's recent changes to air pollution rules, said EPA promised to provide him today estimated benefits, not just costs, of his legislative plan to reduce power plant pollution.
The Democrats' reversal came after it become clear that Senate Republicans could muster the 60 votes needed to end the Democrats' delaying tactics, which were to protest Bush administration environmental policies.
Clinton dropped her opposition after the White House told her in a letter that it would take additional action over two years to protect New Yorkers exposed to airborne pollution from the World Trade Center rubble.
Well, it is just an AP reprint, so technically you're correct, it isn't from anyone on the Comical staff.
I wonder what she is hiding up her smelly armpit. Please forgive the expression. I know it's revolting, but I just can't help it. The Clintons bring out the worse in me.
Simple solution to the pollution - put Hillary in an institution.
Democrats don't cave unless they are forced to. My guess is that the polls are telling them that the judicial obstructionism is being seen for what it is, and the EPA spot is seen as less important.
The trial lawyer lobby has trumped the greens.
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