"The EPA's Clean Power Plan Will Hurt the Poor and Middle Class the Most". In 2010, a Democratic Congress refused to pass President Obama’s “green” agenda to implement a national cap-and-trade system. Now the Administration is trying to use the Environmental Protection Agency to force the states to put his scheme into effect. Often ignored in this debate is the harm the Obama plan will inflict on people who will lose their jobs and on those who can’t effort higher prices.