The question of who regulates pollution in Texas -- the state itself or the federal government -- could be decided by the Supreme Court just in time to create political fallout for the 2012 presidential election, the
National Journal reports. Texas, led by Republican Gov. Rick Perry, is suing President Barack Obama's Environmental Protection Agency to overturn new greenhouse-gas limits which the federal government is enforcing by taking over the state's pollution permitting process.
"Texas, it may or may not win the lawsuit -- it probably won't," says National Journal correspondent Coral Davenport. "But it's just taking a stand. It's just refusing to comply. I think behind the scenes there are a lot of Republicans and certainly many leaders in the oil industry who are going to give . . . Gov. Perry a lot of support for what he's doing."
The states'-rights stance will be "good politically" for Perry and difficult for a Democratic White House, Davenport says. But the politics could change, she says, depending on which way the courts rule. More than a dozen states have joined the Texas EPA lawsuit, which is on a timetable to land before the nation's highest court just as Americans are preparing to pick their next president.
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