State vehicle inspections that include emissions testing may seem to be a routine part of life but their roots go back to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), a federally funded agency. This tie-in prompts a reasonable question: are these state-run programs truly local decisions, or are they a form of federal overreach?
Recent Legislation in NC
SB 341, co-sponsored by Senator Steve Jarvis (R-Davidson) in 2023, aimed to reduce or eliminate vehicle emissions testing across North Carolina. It influenced the 2023 state budget (Session Law 2023-134), which directed the NC Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) to end emissions testing in 18 of the 19 counties where it's required, leaving only Mecklenburg among NC's 100 counties requiring emissions. This change was still pending EPA approval as of August 2024.
According to the North Carolina General Assembly website SB 341’s last action in the 2023-2024 session was on April 4, 2023, when it was reported favorably with a committee substitute and referred to the Senate Transportation Committee. There’s no record of it passing the Senate or becoming law directly in that session. Instead, its core intent was folded into Session Law 2023-134, enacted as part of the 2023 budget, which means SB 341 itself didn’t need to progress further as a standalone bill in 2023-2024—its goal was effectively achieved through the budget process.
Background of EPA Endangerment Ruling
The EPA’s authority stems from the Clean Air Act, strengthened in the 1970s and 1990s, which directs states with subpar air quality to enforce Inspection and Maintenance (I/M) programs. States that resist can lose federal highway funding—a hefty nudge to fall in line. While states handle the logistics, the EPA, backed by federal money, calls the shots. This arrangement can seem less like a state initiative, and more like a federal directive.
In states like Ohio or Georgia, emissions testing often feels like a federal requirement rather than a homegrown idea. What is even more strange is that the EPA was able to get the Supreme Court to classify carbon dioxide (CO2) as a toxic pollutant. That gives broad powers to regulate many activities of life, and our ability to produce food.
Chevron Deference throws a wrench into the tailpipe checks
On June 28, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court - in a 6-3 decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo - overruled the Chevron Deference, a 40-year-old precedent from Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council (1984). This doctrine had required federal courts to defer to reasonable agency interpretations of ambiguous laws, giving agencies like the EPA significant regulatory power. Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, declared that courts must now exercise independent judgment, stating, “Chevron is overruled. Courts may not defer to an agency interpretation of the law simply because a statute is ambiguous.”
Trump targeting EPA Authority
President Trump’s latest effort to scrap the EPA’s 2007 CO2 ruling brings fresh fuel to the debate. That ruling classified carbon dioxide as a pollutant, empowering the EPA to regulate vehicle emissions. Trump, now in office again in 2025, wants it reversed, calling it federal overreach. His EPA pick, Lee Zeldin, noted in January 2025 that the agency isn’t required to regulate CO2, just allowed to. Then he put out an announcement on March 12, about reconsidering the previous EPA policies.
This isn’t just about air quality—it’s about who’s in charge. With the EPA’s federal funding, President Trump’s deregulation push, and CO2’s role in nature, state inspections start looking like a federal imposition rather than a state choice. It boils down to the same issue, which is states versus federal power.
Article V is the solution as big as the problem
The Founders believed that the structures of a limited government would provide the greatest protection of liberty. Not only were there to be checks and balances between the branches of the federal government, but power was also to be delineated between the states and federal government. The latter was to exercise only those “few and defined” specifically granted in the Constitution, while the states’ powers were left “broad and undefined.”
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