Political Quotes

“probably every single one of us in the Senate would agree that it is hard to get here, it is hard to stay here, and it is wonderful to be able to accomplish something worthwhile while you are here. That is why I am here today--because I want to call attention to an announcement that was made this morning by a bipartisan group of U.S. Senators and the Secretary of the Interior, Ryan Zinke, which could take away the $11.6 billion of national park maintenance backlog in the 417 national parks that we have. The proposal we made this morning could eliminate that backlog over the next 10 years. I want to give Secretary Zinke and the President a lot of credit for this because they have agreed to do something that no other President and no other Secretary of the Interior have ever agreed to do, as far as I know, and that is to allow us to use revenues from energy development on Federal lands as mandatory spending to pay for the maintenance backlog in our National Park System. Ken Burns called our national parks ``America's Best Idea.'' I would say that the best idea to support America's best idea is the proposal that Secretary Zinke has made to take care of the maintenance backlog in our national parks. Half of that maintenance backlog is our roads.…”