Jared Huffman: “We were under the impression that this was essentially a closed rule. Many of our beneficial amendments were rejected…”

“We were under the impression that this was essentially a closed rule. Many of our beneficial amendments were rejected out of hand or ruled out of order, but apparently, there is always room for an amendment that will make the bill worse. We have a great example of that right now. CO<INF>2</INF> sequestration benefits and potential ecosystem benefits of biochar are a couple of the most attractive possibilities for this program. I know Chairman Westerman believes that because we have talked about biochar. He has talked about the possibilities of this. The truth is that the science on biochar is not settled. We have more work to do by way of studies, so establishing a program to carry out demonstration programs for the development and commercialization of biochar could be a good opportunity to better understand its role in a healthy forest and explore some of these interesting potential benefits. Now, with this amendment, we have to do it with ideological blinders on because apparently merely mentioning words like CO<INF>2</INF> sequestration and ecosystem benefits are triggering, so we are going to end that part of the study. We are going to put the ideological blinders on. We are going to fire the scientists. We are going to burn the books and rename the Gulf of Mexico. This is just remarkably wrongheaded. I am so surprised and disappointed. The chairman actually put a good provision into his bill.…”