The Lone Star State governor's drive to gain more control of clean air regulations, Medicaid health coverage for the poor, immigration and border security will sharpen the national attention on Perry just as he becomes the new chairman of the Republican Governors Association.

With that, the ambitious 60-year-old West Texas politician is expected to fortify a coast-to-coast crusade against what he calls the long and oppressive reach of Uncle Sam.

"The timing is right," says University of Houston political scientist Jim Granato. "With the wind of the November elections at his back, Gov. Perry could sustain and even accelerate the (Republicans') current political momentum."

By galvanizing GOP governors, coordinating efforts with ascendant Republicans on Capitol Hill and barnstorming on behalf of his book, Fed Up! Our Fight to Save America from Washington, Perry hopes to foment a rebellion against federal regulation that could trigger the most sweeping devolution of federal powers to the states in decades.

"The governor has a great passion for freeing states from the one-size-fits-all mentality. He firmly believes that if you unleash the states you get good ideas for solving problems — not a magic wand, but good ideas," says Dave Carney, a veteran GOP political consultant and Perry confidante.

Anti-Washington 'games'

Texas Democrats, on the other hand, take umbrage.

"Perry employs his version of a states' rights campaign, which is to rail against the federal government while completely ignoring every state issue that really matters to Texas," said Anthony Gutierrez, a spokesman for the Texas Democratic Party. "Perry's anti-Washington political games have scored him political points but they've left Texas with struggling schools, children without health insurance and a battered environment."

Perry's coming offensive reflects the priorities of the tea party rebellion that resulted in significant GOP midterm election gains.

"Perry sees these disputes as a springboard to leading the 10th Amendment revolt," says Norman Ornstein, a political scientist at the conservative-leaning American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C. "He clearly wants the confrontation with the federal government."

The Constitution's 10th Amendment, part of the Bill of Rights, reserves government powers for the states and the people that have not been explicitly granted to the federal government by the Constitution. Ardent defense of that provision became the mantra of tea party activists and conservative Republicans challenging the widening role of federal government and spending during the Nov. 2 elections.

The theme contributed to the GOP retaking political control of the House and bringing Republicans within six seats of gaining control of the 100-seat Senate.

Topping Perry's anti-Washington agenda is a January showdown with the Environmental Protection Agency that will showcase Texas' defiance of federal requirements for states to control greenhouse gas emissions by issuing EPA-approved permits for large industrial facilities to build or expand.

"Perry's cause is widely shared among the newly elected Republican members of Congress, so I'm sure he'll get a good reception," says University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato. "Environmental legislation like cap and trade is as dead as can be, and the EPA is in for rough going in the new Congress."

Perry has been shadow-boxing with the EPA for years, faulting findings that greenhouse gas emissions pose a potential health hazard, warning that environmental regulations could impede Texas' economic miracle and going to court to try to block implementation of provisions of the Clean Air Act that would affect Texas.

He is vowing, he says, to fight "EPA's misguided plan" and to "defend Texas' freedom to continue our successful environmental strategies free from federal overreach."

'Packaged by politicians'

Ironically, all of that has been taking place as the quality of Texas' air has steadily improved since 1994 when the Clean Air Act handed the EPA authority to work with states to develop an air pollution permitting system.

"States and the federal government are supposed to work out this kind of thing," says Matthew Tejada, executive director of Air Alliance Houston. "But it's being packaged by politicians as a federal overreach into states' rights and that couldn't be further from the truth."

Perry is expected to continue a broader states' rights campaign in the months ahead.

He already has issued a statement pushing for an overhaul of the federal Medicaid program to give states more control over their own programs, especially since the new health care law will increase the state's spending for health care.

Perry simultaneously casts himself as the truth-telling Texan who can unmask what he insists on calling Social Security's "Ponzi scheme." His goal is to win states the option of withdrawing local government employees from the federal pension and disability system.

Congress and governors can deal with the politically sensitive issue by "standing up and basically telling the truth about it and not being afraid," Perry insists.

As for immigration and border security, Perry continues to harness state resources such as the Texas National Guard and Texas Rangers to help protect the U.S. border from Mexico's drug violence and criticizes the feds for failing to protect the nation's security.

His headline-grabbing efforts helped force the Obama administration to pay for deployment of some 1,200 National Guard troops along the 1,969-mile border in the four states bordering Mexico.

Perry is preparing to revamp the Republican Governors Association to focus more on policy and energize states' push-back against the federal government.

"There's just no question that Rick Perry views his upcoming term as chairman as an opportunity to raise his issues and his national profile," says Cal Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University.

2012 ambitions denied

Perry burnished his role as a champion of states' rights in 2009 while fending off a primary campaign from U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. He claimed federal government had "become oppressive in its size, its intrusion into the lives of our citizens and its interference with the affairs of our state" and raised a thinly veiled suggestion of Texas' secession from the Union.

Perry denies his federalism fight is a steppingstone to a national campaign in 2012 - a claim greeted with skepticism by some outsiders like Sabato, the University of Virginia scholar:

"The more prominent he is on states' rights topics, the more he will become a tea party favorite, and thus in position to run for president if he decides to do it."

Washington bureau chief Richard S. Dunham contributed to this report.

stewart.powell@chron.com