President-elect Trump had this rule in mind when he promised to unwind regulations now strangling coal miners. And, as the new Congress looks for a way to reassert its constitutional authority over unelected regulators, it won’t find a better target than the stream rule.

Here’s why:

• There’s no environmental benefit from this massive re-write of more than 400 separate regulations. It does nothing to protect our streams that states and other federal agencies aren’t already doing. It only engenders more confusion and bickering among various agencies.
• OSM’s own annual reports confirm that, under the watchful eye of the states, coal mines are being successfully reclaimed with virtually no off-site impacts. The reward for these states, though, after a job well done, is a massive, unnecessary, and expensive federal rule developed without consulting the agencies that actually regulate 97 percent of all coal mines in this country.
• The economic impacts predicted by OSM are in a word, preposterous. The agency believes the rule will create almost as many jobs as it will destroy. But OSM never once visited any coal mines to assess the rule’s costs. Instead, it preferred to stay in Washington and rely upon computer models.

Small wonder that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky, and House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., have placed the stream rule in the congressional cross hairs. They also have the weapon to kill it.

Under the Congressional Review Act, Congress can pass within 60 days a resolution disapproving the stream rule. A simple majority vote by each House is all that’s required. Trump would undoubtedly sign it since he has called out Washington’s regulators for deliberately destroying coal mining jobs and the communities they support.

The outgoing administration’s determination to destroy more coal jobs with the extreme stream rule suggests that half measures won’t work. To honor campaign pledges to help coal miners, Congress should take decisive action and pass a resolution of disapproval without delay.