Ryan Zinke

And do I have your commitment you will work with this committee to make sure that the wonderful Village of King Cove has access to healthcare?

You would identify, and you would agree that not having the critical minerals identified and produced in this country would present a security problem and prevent us from moving ahead on multiple issues, and we are vulnerable to China for…

So is there a plan that you know of, of what are we going to do?

It is pretty much a 'yes' and 'no.' It is your policy, madam?

I would assume it is your policy to source critical minerals from ourselves or our allies rather than foreign countries, like China and Russia.

I encourage us all to look at maybe a pilot program on a forest scale of, you know, that scale, and look at it and see if we can do longer-term contracts.

Eisenhower talked about the military industrial complex, and now we have firefighting industrial complex.

For the record, clean water does start in Montana.

But you said you would work in coordination with the States, and you haven't been to Montana.

And also these mills, we have to guarantee them, to a degree, enough material so they can survive.

If you don't hook a kid by--the statistics were compelling. If you don't hook a young adult by the time he is 14 or so, you know, they don't develop the deep love for the land.

I can list all the farmers that you say that support this thing, and there isn't a one of them that I know that supports water of the U.S., your rule, sir.

My understanding is 90 percent of solar cells get deposited in some landfill somewhere across this country.

there is probably nothing that is more divisive and more contentious than is this rule in the West with farmers and ranchers.

We want to work with you and make sure you have the tools necessary to go after, and the goals are the same.

So EV world. We know that Russia, China, and perhaps our adversaries, have the market share of materials, whether it is lithium, whether it is cobalt.

I am a military guy. I love a plan, but if we don't have a plan, I can tell you when we get there, it is not going to be what we think or oftentimes what we like.

I have told the Secretary of Energy not to cave that in because we are going to need a place to store the 52 or 53 Academy of Science studies that have been done on that.

Are you aware it will take 2000 percent increase in 20 years to catch up of where we are today in critical minerals?

I would encourage us all to look at maybe a couple of pilot programs in different regions, you know, to look at a different model that perhaps would sidestep some of the point litigation that is going on on a small timber sale.

We need to have a serious discussion about how to do more with less.

I do believe that if that was changed, then you would see a lot more participation with the Good Neighbor authority because it really is a great tool for how we do our work.

I think it has been like 30, 35 years now.

The Great American Outdoors Act solved that. As long as the money goes to infrastructure and not studies, I think we will be in pretty good shape.

Rolling back the WOTUS rule received bipartisan support in Congress, and I hope that is a clear message to the administration that Americans are concerned about overregulation.