Our bill is the only chemical reform bill ‘on the playing field,’ Vitter says

Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) said the bill he’s co-sponsored with Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) to reform the nation’s chemical laws is the only legislation “on the playing field.”

“Our co-sponsors, Democrats and Republicans, continue to grow,” he said during a Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing on Wednesday. “The Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act is the only realistic shot we have at reforming a very outdated and broken system.”

Committee Chair Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) said TSCA will not be reformed without bipartisan support and input from stakeholders. Though opponents have accused the Udall-Vitter bill of being legislation generated by industry, Inhofe noted that no one from industry was testifying at Wednesday’s hearing.

“Not because no one from industry supports the bill,” he said. “The majority has chosen witnesses to focus on the health and environmental impacts of the bill.”

But Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who introduced a competing bill with Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) to reform the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), said she’s never seen such opposition to the Udall-Vitter bill.

She then had her staff stand will posters listing all the of the opposing groups.

“I know you can’t read them all, but there are 450 organizations,” she said.

A few of the names she read aloud included the Environmental Working Group, Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families, the American Nurses Association and Physicians for Social Responsibility.