On April 24, House Energy and Air Quality Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher (D-VA) said that the Republican leadership is not allowing rank-and-file Republicans to enter negotiations on a mandatory cap-and-trade bill. Boucher said that without the support of Republicans, he doubts that climate change legislation is possible and that it would be bad policy-wise and politically unsuccessful to try to pass a purely partisan bill.
Energy and Commerce (E&C) Committee Ranking Member Joe Barton (R-TX), a skeptic of climate change, was recently quoted as saying that, given the state of the economy, putting together a cap-and-trade bill would be "political suicide" and that the "steam has gone out of this issue for this Congress." E&AQ Subcommittee Ranking Member Fred Upton (R-MI), who in the past has been supportive of climate change measures, indicated he would wait to see what the Senate does on cap-and-trade before determining what action the House would take.