Political Quotes

“I come to the floor to speak against the Trump administration's egregious attack on our pristine coastlines in the Pacific, the Atlantic, Alaska, and the eastern Gulf of Mexico. Dramatic increases in oil and gas development offshore pose a direct threat to our coastal economies in the United States, particularly in the Pacific Northwest. I know many of my colleagues are going to join me on the floor this afternoon to talk about this and about the specific impacts in their areas. The draft leasing plan, which is what has been put forth by the Secretary of the Interior, is an unprecedented attempt to allow offshore oil and gas drilling in over 90 percent of the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf, including in Washington and Oregon. The truth is that instead of creating new jobs in the oil and gas sector, the administration is poised to choose big oil jobs over the ocean-dependent industries like fishing, shipbuilding, and tourism on our coasts. I know this because I just traveled to many of our coastal communities in the State of Washington, which make their livelihoods off of fishing or tourism, that are very concerned by this proposal. And just yesterday, a public hearing was supposed to take place in Tacoma, WA, which was canceled. The Trump administration failed to account for the value of the existing robust coastal and ocean economies that could be jeopardized by expanding offshore drilling in those areas.…”