LYNCHBURG -- Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli stands ready to take more legal action against the federal government if the Environmental Protection Agency announces new fuel-economy standards for vehicles today, he said yesterday.
Cuccinelli has sued the EPA over its finding that greenhouse gases harm people, and if it issues regulations that are based on that finding, "we will sue them again," he told the Lynchburg Regional Chamber of Commerce.
Virginia's Democratic Party renewed its accusations yesterday that two Cuccinelli lawsuits against the federal government -- over global warming and health care -- are wasting the state's resources "to wage a personal, political fight."
Cuccinelli replied that he's taking action to protect Virginia jobs and save the state government billions in probable expenses if federal regulations to control carbon dioxide and reform the health-care system take effect.
Cuccinelli spent more than an hour explaining to about 100 chamber members that he was "on the right side" on three high-profile issues: a letter in which he advised colleges that they can't legally designate sexual orientation as a protection from discrimination and the suits on global warming and the federal health-care bill.
Other than those issues, his 2½ months in office "have been pretty boring," Cuccinelli said, as the audience in Liberty University Law School's Supreme Court room chuckled.
Cuccinelli also said he expects to help legislators add a property-rights amendment to the Virginia Constitution starting in 2011.
Such an amendment would collide with eminent-domain laws, which have become increasingly controversial as localities have used them to take private property for redevelopment projects in recent years.
Ray Reed is a staff writer for The News & Advance in Lynchburg.
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