Political Quotes

“listening to this, you would think that people who want some commonsense regulation don't believe in clean water. You would think that if we do this, somehow the Charles River or the Cuyahoga River, having been navigable the whole while here under the Clean Water Act jurisdiction, would suddenly not be navigable. That is not the case. That is not the case. I think it is really important that we ratchet down the emotion and we start looking at the facts. Let's start with where we are right now with this idea of what are, in fact, jurisdictional waters under the Clean Water Act. This has been a debate for 40 years. It has been in and out of the courts for 40 years. In 1985 the Court made a ruling. In 2001 the Court made a ruling. In 2006 the Court decided a case called Rapanos. What Rapanos said is--four Justices said EPA is right, four Justices said EPA is wrong, and one Justice said EPA may be right. As a result, we have created a system that has caused great uncertainty in America today as it relates to how we use land. Acting on that uncertainty, EPA promulgated a rule. That rule is inconsistent, in my opinion, with the direction they were given by the Court. That rule has created an incredible amount of uncertainty.…”