Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, last weekend, a record blizzard hit my State of South Dakota. Some places in the Black Hills saw almost 4 feet of snow in just 2 days. Thousands were without power. Thousands are still without power. Emergency vehicles were stranded along with the people that they were trying to rescue. The damage from the downed trees, the downed power lines covered with heavy, wet snow is monumental. On top of that, with warm weather expected this week, we expect to see massive flooding that could bring even more damage. On the plains in western South Dakota, ranchers are still trying to recover from losing cattle in the drought last summer, which was the worst drought that we had seen since the Great Depression. {time} 1045 We've heard now that they've lost tens of thousands of cattle in this fall blizzard. We've heard that tens of thousands of cattle have been lost in the snow. They're being found frozen, smothered by the high drifts and injured from wandering in zero visibility in 70-mile-per- hour winds. We talked with one rancher near White River, South Dakota, who found over 50 cattle who had died in one spot near a dam. Another rancher north of New Underwood was finally able to locate his entire herd of 63 cows who'd taken refuge in a shed for protection, but none of them survived. Another story is from a rancher near Union Center who said, ``It's bad. It's really bad. I'm the eternal optimist, but this is really bad. The livestock loss is catastrophic.…”