Swift repeal of Obama rules leaves former staffers steaming

“It’s devastating, of course,” said Alexandra Teitz, a longtime Democratic Hill aide who joined Interior’s Bureau of Land Management in 2014 as a counselor to the agency’s director and worked on a rule to curb methane waste from oil and gas production. A House-passed Congressional Review Act resolution targeting that rule awaits action in the Senate.

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Pizarchik and other former Obama administration officials called the rapid repeal process intensely unfair. The 1996 law says any repeal must come within 60 legislative days after a rule becomes final.

“If there had been more time and Congress had not rushed this through but had actually deliberated on what was in the rule, [then] the results would have been different,” Pizarchik said.

But proponents of the repeal process maintain that it is a blunt but necessary tool.

“It’s important that Congress have a say in the rules that are applied in this country,” said James Gattuso of the Heritage Foundation. “The CRA just makes it easier for Congress and the president to make sure the rules and actions of the agencies reflect their priority.”

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