On the recordJune 15, 2011
This amendment prevents any taxpayer funds from being used to implement the Department of Agriculture's new rule and regulation titled Policy Statement on Climate Change Adaptation. Mr. Chairman, we've had this debate on cap-and-trade in the last Congress. In fact, there was a bipartisan coalition of Members that voted and ultimately defeated the cap-and-trade proposal by President Obama brought in the last Congress. And yet here we now have a new regulation that was just issued by the Department of Agriculture less than 2 weeks ago to implement, in essence, a back-door attempt to put a cap-and-trade program in place in the Department of Agriculture. And if you'll look at some of the details laid out in this policy statement, this is a regulation that was just implemented by the Department of Agriculture. It gives new powers to the Department to go into areas where right now we, as a Congress, have said we don't want the administration to be going. In fact, if you'll look at what agencies like the EPA are doing in trying to implement other forms of cap-and-trade, global warming, carbon emission-type programs, we've been rolling those agencies back. We've been having hearings that have showed how this is not only bad policy but this will kill jobs in America. And so if you look at some of the provisions in this, the policy establishes a USDA-wide directive to integrate climate change adaptation planning into USDA programs, policies, and operations. Mr.…
