Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh is joining a lawsuit that challenges the Trump administrations rollbacks of national clean car standards. 
Frosh joins 23 other attorneys general and several other stakeholders in filing a lawsuit that challenges the vehicle fuel efficiency rollbacks issued earlier this year. When the Trump administration unveiled the anticipated rollbacks, Frosh remarked that the change “threatens the health of millions of Americans and will cause irreparable damage to our environment.”
At the end of last March, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the The U.S. Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) issued a final rule on fuel economy standards, effectively instituting a rollback of previously planned clean car regulations. Regulations established in 2012 would require that car manufacturers increase fuel efficiency and CO2 emissions standards 5 percent annually, but newer rules only require 1.5 percent increases each year for model years 2021-2026. The final rule change was instituted by the administration in an attempt to make new cars more affordable and therefore encourage consumers with older model year vehicles to upgrade to cars that produce less emissions.
The coalition lawsuit will challenge the final rule change because they believe it violates the Clean Air Act, the Energy Policy and Conservation Act, and the Administrative Procedure Act. They believe that it violates congressional mandates and relies on faulty evidence.
From a press release:
“Rolling back the Clean Car Standards will endanger the health of countless Americans. It will pollute our air and water, accelerate climate change and be costly for consumers,” said Attorney
General Frosh. “It’s heedless and illegal. It’s a gift to the fossil fuel industry at great expense to the American people.”
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