As we start 2020, we seem to be revisiting a topic that resonated throughout the Midwest and especially in Iowa over the past three years. Biofuels supporters are once again asking President Donald Trump to uphold the law and support the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). Once again, a court has mandated that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) hold up its end of the law, and once again, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) is leading the charge to fight the courts and try to undermine federal law in support of oil companies.
Audio: Full Interview with RFA President & CEO Geoff Cooper
Renewable Fuels Association President and CEO Geoff Cooper talked with me at Commodity Classic in San Antonio. We got an update as to where things were after we last spoke in Iowa during the 2020 Renewable Fuels Summit. Cooper talked about the Federal Court’s decision to have the EPA stop abusing Small Refinery Exemptions (SREs) and uphold the law.
However, it isn?t the first time a federal court has told the EPA to uphold the law and stop granting unwarranted waivers. However, the EPA has ignored court decisions, agreements, and Federal Law for the past few years.
However, before you celebrate the lack of wiggle room for the EPA to maneuver out of this court ruling; you may want to pull back on the reins. Iowa?s old friend Senator Ted Cruz of Texas is trying to get President Trump to throw his support behind the refineries this ruling involved and support the appeal to the court?s decision. You might think that would never happen, that President Trump has been a strong supporter of the biofuels industry and helped us get year-round E15 across the finish line. Well, you are right on those counts, but right now the latest reports are that the White House may go along with Senator Cruz?s demands.
In response to this, several agriculture and biofuels groups released the following statement:
?The president needs to understand that Ted Cruz doesn?t care about this administration or families across the heartland who are counting on the White House to keep its promises. Just days ago, thousands of farmers rallied behind Secretary Perdue, who expressed his confidence that we had finally reached the end of a long and painful fight against EPA demand destruction. Tearing open that wound, against the advice of rural champions and the president?s own advisors, would be viewed as a stunning betrayal of America?s rural workers and farmers. We cannot stress enough how important this decision is to the future of the rural economy and to President Trump?s relationship with leaders and voters across the heartland. Ted Cruz comes back year after year with the same lies about refinery profits, disproven over and over by economists, the EPA, and even by Big Oil. We urge the president to stand up now against this misguided effort to torpedo the rural recovery.?
The statement was issued by the National Corn Growers Association, the Renewable Fuels Association, the American Soybean Association, the National Farmers Union, Growth Energy, the American Coalition for Ethanol, the National Biodiesel Board, the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association, and Fuels America.
Cooper says this ruling should have no effect on the rules that EPA finalized at the end of 2019. You remember; the rules that went against an agreement they made in the Oval Office with the President and the biofuels industry and its supporters in October? Cooper says we need to get to 15 billion gallons, and we are starting in a four-billion-gallon hole.
This is not the first time that Senator Cruz has tried to undermine the Renewable Fuels Standard or play politics with one of the strongest Iowa industries. If you have forgotten how much the success of Iowa Farmers and biofuels gets under Senator Cruz?s skin, just ask USDA Undersecretary and former Iowa Ag Secretary Bill Northey.
