Angie Craig: “before the ranking member of the Agriculture Committee sits down, I would be more than happy to include the protection…”

“before the ranking member of the Agriculture Committee sits down, I would be more than happy to include the protection of all the old growth in the Federal forests of Iowa in this bill, if it existed. Or maybe we could put a prohibition against wildfires in Iowa on public lands in this bill. And that is something we could accomplish because those two issues--the old growth, which I am sure the State of Iowa wished it had, and wildfires, which I know they would not want--do not exist in Iowa because no Federal forest lands exist there. In my State of Idaho, in the great State of Oregon, and in the Great Basin, West, as much as 60 and 70 percent of our lands within our State borders are public lands and are subject to this legislation. That is why I am on the Senate floor. That is why my colleague from Missouri is on the Senate floor. That is why my colleague from California is on the Senate floor because it is the heart and soul of our States. Be it our water quality or our wildlife habitat or our environment in general, our forested lands make up that dynamic symphony of lands of which our States are proud, and we want to protect them. To suggest this bill does not is not a fact. Let me give a point the Senator from Iowa just made. He said you could log in 1,000-acre increments across the landscape. Not true. Nowhere in the bill does it exist. Let's go back to California today where fires are burning.…”