At Virginia Beach forum, Cuccinelli discusses legal issues

VIRGINIA BEACH

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli made his legal challenges to the federal government the centerpiece of his talk on leadership Wednesday at a Regent University forum.

"I've never been aware of this time in history when this many states have sued the government," he told an audience of about 500 at the university's monthly executive leadership series. "The assertions that we don't have a chance are long gone."

When he first launched his lawsuit challenging the federal health care law, he said, some people told him he was politically posturing. Now, after a lower court victory, the tone has changed, he said. Earlier this month, he filed a petition to fast-track the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

He said the suit sends a message that government control has gotten out of hand. Specifically, Cuccinelli is challenging the law's requirement that Americans purchase health insurance or pay a penalty.

"The health care lawsuit is about liberty. If the federal government can do it with health care, they can do it anywhere else too," he said. "As long as I'm in this office, I'm not going to back down."

Cuccinelli also spoke about a legal challenge he filed last year against the Environmental Protection Agency, seeking to force it to reconsider its finding that greenhouse gases are a danger to public health. He argued the EPA relied on flawed research.

"I have a great respect for science... and that does not seem to be highly regarded at the EPA," he said.

But several climate experts question claims of fraud cited in Cuccinelli's lawsuit against the EPA.

Most notably, citing an independent 2009 report, Cuccinelli's complaint asserts that climate scientists at the University of East Anglia doctored Russian temperature data to exaggerate global warming.

Yet Alexander Bedritskiy, president of the World Meteorological Organization and the top climate change adviser to President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia, said that the 2009 report was thoroughly discredited by top scientists in his country more than a year ago. He also noted that the author of that report, Andrei Illarionov, is not a climate scientist but an economist with the Cato Institute, a conservative research group in the United States.

At Wednesday's event, though, Cuccinelli found a receptive audience.

Rosalin Gilbert, a retired teacher who lives in Chesapeake, called Cuccinelli a man who "can challenge your mind and thinking."

"What he says makes sense," she said.

Peter Sellers of Virginia Beach called himself "a fiscal, economic and political conservative" and said Cuccinelli's message resonates deeply with him.

"Cuccinelli falls right into what I would think of and how I would think," Sellers said. "I don't want my government to interfere with my life."

The New York Times contributed to this report.

Jennifer Jiggetts, (757) 222-5150, jennifer.jiggetts@pilotonline.com