Political Quotes

“I just want to thank Senator Wyden for his cooperation working on this nominee. Mr. Sams, I do agree, is qualified. We had a long discussion this afternoon about some of the big issues that are impacting my State as it relates to the National Park Service. You know, a lot of people love the National Park Service. Two-thirds of all National Park Service land in America is in Alaska--tens of millions of acres. It is bigger than almost every other State represented here on the Senate floor. That is just the National Park Service. For decades, that Federal authority--the National Park Service authority in Alaska--has been abused. How do we know that it has been abused? Well, we recently had two--two--U.S. Supreme Court decisions that were 9-to-0 decisions, by the way, that essentially said the Park Service was not following the law in Alaska--two. So my discussions with Mr. Sams and the commitments he made to me, I think, are going to help Alaska. I think they are going to help the National Park Service, and it is related to the National Park Service authorities. After these two decisions--they were called the Sturgeon decisions-- two in a row, at the U.S. Supreme Court, 9 to 0, by the way, and the U.S. Supreme Court telling the National Park Service: You are not following the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act. We call it ANILCA in Alaska. You are not following the Federal Government. You need to follow it. So the commitment I got from Mr.…”