Garret Graves

Thank you, Madam Chair. And I also want to thank Mr. Neguse and those of you that had the opportunity to come to Colorado.

If we come in and say, hey, we are going to just stop producing, it doesn't stop demand because you have a system that continue to be dependent upon these energy streams.

In 2011, the year after the BP disaster, one-half of this nation's trade deficit, one-half of the entire trade deficit, was attributable to us importing energy from other countries.

I want to throw out a few things. Number one, I was reading a report a while back that talked about how, for battery storage technology, it takes 50 to 100 pounds of mining rare and critical materials, oftentimes from China, to produce one…

I think I read recently where gas that comes from the United States as compared to Russia is 13 percent cleaner.

We talk often about reducing emissions, which is, of course, an objective I think we all share.

Let me say it again: We have increased our dependence upon oil from Saudi Arabia.

This place is going to be absolutely key in solving the problem, and what I mean by that is the experts, the facilities, the scientists that you have here, the innovation, the moon shot that the Chair just talked about.

We can cut every bit of emissions, every single bit of emissions from the United States today, everything, and it is not going to change the trajectory of warming.

I want to thank all of you for being here to participate in your government. This is what the United States looks like.

I want to thank you very much for hosting this today. Congressman Casten, thanks for coming.

It doesn't matter if you are Republican, Democrat, green, purple, blue, white, whatever. When your land is being taken, when your home is going underwater, when your business is going underwater, when your history, your culture is going…

We lose a football field of land approximately every hour, a football field every hour.

We have lost 2,000 square miles of our state, 2,000.

The levee system actually stabilizes the ecosystem that is protected behind it.

We have allowed for this process to just sit there and morph into this complete--just stagnant process that is victimizing the very people that we are representing.

This is so stupid what we are doing.

We are not taking the steps and the policies. We are accepting mediocracy.

I found that shocking.

The Morganza to the Gulf levee protection project is an investment that the citizens of my community have made to build resiliency to the climate crisis.

It is imperative that our coastal communities complete this levee protection project, designed when completed to a height of 18 feet.

Our communities, both in Terrebonne and Lafourche Parishes voted to tax themselves to begin building the system.

The reason Arkansas doesn't evacuate when hurricanes come is because they have a buffer. It is called Louisiana.

We have to have the tools, we have to have the processes in place that recognize the urgency of the challenges that we are facing today.

We have made some of the most substantial investments in resiliency that we have ever made in the United States.