Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin this week announced she was signing on to a bill to curtail the Environmental Protection Agency after the agency's new Renewable Fuel Standard rule incorporated a controversial factor called "international indirect land use" that could threaten corn ethanol.

That bill goes further, however — it also would remove the EPA's authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.

This is a new position for Herseth Sandlin. Last May, I wrote about Sen. John Thune's battle with the EPA, in which he was pushing a bill very much like the one Herseth Sandlin has signed on to now.

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At the time Herseth Sandlin wasn't a fan.

Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin said she is concerned about EPA decisions harming South Dakota agriculture and could consider taking action to curtail its authority. But she said she believes a confrontation can be avoided by expressing concerns to members of the Obama administration.

“I think we’ll have White House support as it relates to the work of the EPA on a number of these issues,” Herseth Sandlin said.

Yesterday, Herseth Sandlin had a different tune:

"EPA’s inclusion of international indirect land use calculations as part of the final rule, and then incorrectly applying those calculations only to corn-based ethanol is unacceptable and will require corrective legislative action. ... The bill, HR4572, would also ... amend the clean air act to make clear it doesn’t allow for regulation of greenhouse gases as it relates to global climate change."

It's unclear at this point whether her shift was due to disappointment with results of the back-channel efforts she had been trying before, a growing sense of unease about where the EPA is going, or political pressures at home in South Dakota (or some combination of the above). Clearly it's a winning political stand for her to take — the EPA is not popular at all here in South Dakota, especially when it takes steps that limit ethanol production.