Thank you also to Ms. Chellie Pingree for always taking the time to learn our issues and advocate for the tribal nations located in Maine.

Thank you to everyone on the panel, and I yield back to the chair.

VAWA protections are critically important for our tribe.

I think it is a new thing in Maine as well, ma'am.

H.R. 1, our voting rights, ethics package, and campaign finance reform.

I do have a concern that I want to keep in mind in this Committee about the proposal that has come out of the administration for infrastructure.

I do not feel like it has been a transparent process.

I have a lot of concerns about the proposed relocation and reorganization of NIFA and ERS, and I think every Democrat on this subcommittee and I have expressed our opposition to the plan.

Stakeholders have suggested to me that the ERS reorganization was proposed because research coming out of the agency didn't align with the administration's views on topics such as SNAP or climate change.

I am one of the people who doesn't support the proposed relocation and reorganization of the two USDA agricultural research agencies, NIFA and ERS.

I think that the reorganization of ERS jeopardizes some of the scientific integrity by injecting politics into the work.

I am actually about to submit a bipartisan bill on ocean acidification which I worked on before.

Any increase we can have in funding makes a huge difference, at the State level.

Obviously in the State of Maine, we care deeply about our relationship with the Nature Conservancy and conservation organizations, and we love our parks.

I think I may be the only person represented in the room who represents a district on the ocean. And I am very pleased that our entire congressional delegation of all parties, Republican, Democrat, and Independent, have opposed offshore…

I am really appreciative of how the tribe comes together as a community and uses traditions from the community to engage people at all levels.

I look forward to our visit to Walter Reed. I have heard about the program before, and thank you for your testimony.

Thank you for your testimony.