Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Andrew Wheeler announced the agency’s final rule to strengthen the transparency of its scientific information this morning during a policy forum hosted by the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
The final rule calls on the EPA to provide greater consideration to studies determined to be pivotal science where the underlying data is available for public review and scrutiny.
“Too often Congress shirks its responsibility and defers important decisions to regulatory agencies. These regulators then invoke science to justify their actions, often without letting the public study the underlying data,” wrote Administrator Wheeler in a Wall Street Journal op-ed accompanying the roll-out of the rule. “If the American people are to be regulated by interpretation of these scientific studies, they deserve to scrutinize the data as part of the scientific process and American self-government,” he continued.
The rule was first proposed in April of 2018 and supported by a coalition of conservative organizations urging the Trump administration to provide full transparency of all scientific data and studies used to justify all pending or new regulations.
Americans for Tax Reform applauds Administrator Wheeler for finalizing the EPA’s rule strengthening scientific transparency. Too often, the underlying data used by regulators to justify the growth of government is withheld from the public. The finalization of this rule furthers the public’s ability to review critical data for themselves and reflects the strong public support for greater transparency in government.