Political Quotes

“I rise in opposition to the amendment offered by our colleague from Utah. This amendment would undermine the National Environmental Policy Act, also known as NEPA, by allowing States to assume responsibility for undertaking complex reviews of Federal action. These are reviews that Congress vested explicitly in the Federal Agencies that permit or license projects that could adversely affect our environment. NEPA is designed to ensure that Federal Agencies consider major actions carefully to ensure those decisions do not unduly impact water quality, endangered species, community well-being, air quality, and other environmental resources. NEPA is a critical analytical tool that ensures that Federal decision makers are better informed and that the affected community has an opportunity to engage and be heard. Today, as the world is in the midst of a sixth great extinction event, and climate change is having ever greater impacts on our natural world, we should be making decisions more carefully than ever, not just to improve outcomes but also to avoid wasting money on projects that are not resilient to withstand climate change. This amendment would instead turn over responsibility for that critical analysis to the States. The bill before us includes many environmental deregulatory provisions--more, in fact, than many of us would prefer. However, it has been drafted in the spirit of bipartisan compromise.…”