Jeff Merkley

I look forward to that conversation over infrastructure.

I agree with you we don't want to return to the cycle of borrowing or forced cuts to programs.

For the first time in a 105 years, there is no water in the Klamath Basin for our irrigators.

We're seeing fiercer storms. We're seeing smaller snow packs.

We're recognizing the growing challenges that plastics pose for both our ecosystems and for human health.

Thank you for this historic request. I'm not thanking you for the budget figures but how this budget is constructed, the disciplined laser focused attention to most urgent issues facing our country and the world.

We are in a climate emergency and the evidence of climate chaos is piling up around us.

I'm grateful that your voice has been lifted up and I can see from this budget request that you're taking the opportunity to lift up the voice of others who are too often silenced.

This budget sends a message that the Biden administration is committed not only to preserving but to fight for our natural world.

This is a program that is low cost loans that go to utilities that then can do low cost loans for energy saving retrofits.

In Oregon, we now have about $2.5 billion worth of projects in the pipeline.

Thank you. I really appreciate your team doing everything possible because it is a massive economic disaster, and it is an environmental disaster.

I have urged FDA Commissioners to do more to address the high rates of youth use of e-cigarettes.

I doubt the costs of that are going to be less than the costs of renewable energy from solar and wind.

Plastics are a climate problem, as well as a direct problem for human health, and great problem for ecosystems.

I was very disturbed at the increasing pace of carbon saturation in the atmosphere.

Often we think about electric vehicles might work well for passenger vehicles, but maybe not for heavy machinery.

You cannot study things forever. There is a point, this is a risk, let us get it out of our products.

So, I want to turn to plastics, plastics have an enormous impact on the environment.

We are taking the wildfire smoke very serious, which is why in this budget we are asking for an increase in our air quality monitoring system.

Well, I hope that every day you can spend part of the day calling and pushing to get TCSA underway.

We see the beaches in Oregon covered, we see marine life that is dying because their guts are full of plastic.

We also need to help communities live with better health, when there is smoke as there is regularly.

Methylene chloride, a paint stripper, still, no action.

I appreciate your interest in working together on this plastics challenge.