Dino Grandoni writes:

President Trump likes to cast himself as a champion of states’ rights. But he stops short when it comes to California and other liberal states.

The latest example comes from Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency, which is on the cusp of revoking California’s authority to regulate heat-trapping emissions from automobiles inside the state.

The decision to spurn California was long expected, and is one in a series of salvos between Trump and one of the nation’s bluest states. The president has also targeted the homeless populations in Los Angeles and San Francisco, claiming during a trip to California yesterday they’re doing damage to the cities’ “prestige” real estate and the federal government is aiming to do something about it.

But it fits into a pattern of Trump’s team brushing aside environmental concerns from a number of states — even Republican-controlled ones — where leaders stand in the way of the interests of the oil and natural gas industry, a key Trump ally.

“This isn’t just about California,” Gay MacGregor, a former senior policy adviser at the EPA’s Office of Transportation and Air Quality who has been critical of the Trump administration, said in an e-mailed statement. “Apparently, the GOP is no longer the champion of states’ rights or clean air.” [Continue reading…]