From the Substack of Robert Malone:

EPA Threatens Locally Produced Beef

In Another Blow to Decentralized Natural Meat Production, EPA Rule Indirectly Shuts Down Small Meat Producers via Clean Water Act Overreach

American’s Will Lose the Choice to Buy Local Meats

On January 23, 2024, under Biden Administration guidance, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed a new rule that will bring 3,879 meat and poultry products (MPP) processing facilities under their jurisdiction….All justified by wastewater levels of Nitrogen and Phosphorus coming from animal meat processing, mirroring the WEF agenda to minimize Nitrogen runoff from European farms which has sparked the widespread farmer protests throughout the European Union.

The new rule involves a major shift in the technology-based effluent limitations guidelines and standards (ELGs) for the meat and poultry industry, threatening their livelihoods by forcing them to add water filtration systems to their facilities.

[This means that a lot of small processing facilities will have to close down.  It will also affect the local foods movement.  “Buy local” will become much more difficult.]

… this rule significantly expands their regulatory overreach.

The Kansas Natural Resource Coalition (KNRC) filed comments opposing the proposed rule and was joined by other [various entities]… states these proposed rules …significantly altering the balance between state and federal powers.

/snip

… the EPA jammed through a finalized version of its devastating new interpretation of the Clean Water Act,…Clearly this is another case of aggressive, arbitrary and capricious EPA regulatory overreach, directly analogous to the recent Supreme Court case West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, 597 U.S. 697 (2022), a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court relating to the Clean Air Act, and the extent to which the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can regulate carbon dioxide emissions related to climate change.

/snip

As a result, The EPA has decided that the entire meat industry – from slaughtering beef to poultry, marinas to packaging – must now retrofit current facilities …to turn “nutrients” into C02 and methane in order to prevent these “pollutants” from entering local water supplies.

The EPA anticipates these new rules will, at least, result in the closure of 16 processing facilities across the country at a time when our country’s meat producers are already struggling to survive due to bottlenecks in USDA certified facilities. However, on the high side EPA estimates include an impact range of up to 845 processing facilities.

/snip

A press release was just put out by a consortium of protein producers who have said this will cost “millions more than the EPA’s highest estimates and result in the loss of tens of thousands of jobs.”

It gets worse;

Facilities can bypass these new regulations by drastically reducing their weekly/annual pounds processed. However, the US population continues to grow (largely due to immigration) at a rate that we’re currently incapable of feeding with record low volumes of meet production. Reducing pounds processed will have sizable impacts upon food security, as will further closures, and supply chain disruptions. These issues have now risen to the point of being a national security threat.

Problems in the rule change;

[insert list of infuriating problems with the decree]

Congressmen Estes and Burlison have proposed H.R 7079, the “BEEF ACT” (formally known as H.R.7079 – Banning EPA’s Encroachment on Facilities Act), as a means of prohibiting the EPA from using its deferential authority (Chevron doctrine) to interpret the Clean Water Act. However, this legislation currently has a 1% chance of being enacted, and only a 4% chance of passing out of the House Committee on Transportation.

In parallel to direct legislative action, there is clearly a need to mount a legal challenge to this action, one which can build upon the precedent established by West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, which should benefit from the anticipated Supreme Court action to overturn the Chevron Deference legal precedent which currently enables this type of regulatory overreach. Further information concerning the Chevron Deference can be found in this substack essay, and SCOTUS Blog has covered the current status of the Supreme Court case in an article titled “Supreme Court likely to discard Chevron”.