Democrat Manchin co-sponsors bill to save gas stoves after GOP protest

Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin joined the fight over gas stoves Thursday, co-sponsoring bipartisan legislation with Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz to stop the government’s ban on appliances.

“The federal government doesn’t have to tell American families how to cook their dinner, which is why Senator Cruz and I introduced bipartisan legislation to ensure Americans decide how to cook in their own homes,” said the Virginia Democrat. Western. said in a statement.

Manchin offered that the “last thing out of our house” is the family’s gas stove, vowing to fight any government “overreach.”

Since Consumer Product Safety Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. gave an interview with Bloomberg in January declaring that ‘every option is on the table’ as far as the future of gas stove use is concerned, Republicans have taken up arms over the issue.

Republican Rep. Ronny Jackson, a former White House physician, said he would rather die than cook with electricity.

Republicans have been angry for weeks after Consumer Product Safety Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. said a ban on gas stoves was on the table as appliances are linked to higher rates of asthma. childish.

‘I will NEVER give up my gas stove. If the maniacs in the White House come for my stove, they can snatch it from my cold, dead hands. COME AND TAKE IT!!’ Jackson said.

When Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pointed out that “continued NO2 exposure from gas stoves is associated with reduced cognitive performance,” Jackson criticized her, sharing a photo of the New York congresswoman’s gas stove.

‘AOC says gas stoves cause ‘reduced cognitive performance’, but does she use a gas stove? Is this a self-diagnosis? Jackson tweeted. ‘AOC, as a doctor, I can tell you this: what happens to your head IS NOT caused by stoves. Something MUCH BIGGER is causing your cognitive function to decline!’

Jackson even went as far as setting up a URL: SaveTheStoves.com – which links to a WinRed donations page, which asks visitors to sign a petition, but also signs them up to receive text messages and calls from Jackson’s congressional campaign.

We can’t let the maniacs in the White House get away with it! Add your name now to the official petition to SAVE OUR STOVES!’ says the website.

Several Republicans pointed to a 2020 tweet that showed First Lady Jill Biden cooking vegetables with gas.

“Rules for you, but not for me,” Cruz tweeted, sharing the image of the first lady.

In a statement Thursday, Cruz said “radical environmentalists” were to blame for a proposed ban.

“The Consumer Product Safety Commission’s proposed ban on gas cooktops is the latest egregious scaremongering from the far left and their Biden administration allies,” Cruz said. “I am pleased to partner with Senator Manchin in this bipartisan effort to prevent the federal government from issuing regulations that put the interests of the Green New Deal ahead of the well-being of American families.”

In his interview with Bloomberg, Trumka had pointed to the more concrete link between the use of gas stoves and childhood asthma.

In an October memo, first reported by Fox News this week and used as evidence that Trumka, a Biden appointee, was serious about a ban, the CPSC commissioner did mention climate change.

“The need to regulate gas stoves has reached a boiling point,” Trumka also said.

It was not clear if the pun was intentional.

“CPSC has a responsibility to ban consumer products that emit hazardous substances, particularly when those emissions harm children, under the federal Hazardous Substances Act,” Trumka wrote. “The emerging evidence is sufficient to conclude that gas stoves in homes emit toxic gases that cause illness and that safer, lower-cost alternatives exist.”

Trumka noted that New York and Los Angeles had already banned stoves in new construction for “health and inequity reasons.”

“Sufficient information is available for the CPSC to issue an NPR in fiscal year 2023 proposing to ban gas stoves in homes,” he said. ‘The additional work required to complete an NPR is primarily economic; There is already available sanitary and scientific evidence on the diseases caused by the corresponding gases in the concentrations present in homes with gas stoves.’

After protests from the GOP, Trumka noted on Twitter that any such ban would only apply to new products.

The White House was also forced to respond.

Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the president “does not support a ban on gas stoves.”

“And the independent Consumer Product Safety Commission is not banning gas stoves,” Jean-Pierre said at his Jan. 11 briefing.