On the recordFebruary 5, 2014
At this time, I yield myself 3 minutes. Mr. Chairman, we have heard a lot about 3-inch fish in this debate. In fact, to hear my colleagues in the Republican Party tell it, this is a story of a 3-inch fish that is taking water away in this critical drought that should be allocated to people. Well, the truth is, Mr. Chairman, you would have to have the brain of a 3-inch fish to believe that narrative. There is no such thing happening in this critical drought year. What is happening, however, is some people are cynically trying to capitalize on the worst drought in California history in order to steal water from some parts of the State and from other water users and give it to a few. In fact, if this bill were accurately named, it would be called the ``Massive Federal Preemption Overreach and Water Theft Act for the Elections of 2014,'' but it is, in fact, pretending to be something quite different. We need to ask ourselves why the State of California is so passionately opposing this bill. Attorney General Kamala Harris wrote a letter just yesterday following the same position that prior attorneys general have always taken on this issue, including Republican attorneys general, that the Federal Government should abide by the 100-year precedent of deference, of cooperative Federalism, letting California administer its own water rights and allocate that water instead of the sweeping preemption that we see in this bill.…
