The Great Lakes are dying, slowly but surely, from decades of toxic industrial and agricultural waste, invasive species, overall neglect, and now, from the ongoing budget stalemate in Congress.
The News Tribune's spot-on concern over threatened deep cuts to the essential federal Great Lakes Restoration Initiative reflects a Congressional budget process in free fall -- a perfect example of why I took to the Floor and urged Speaker Boehner to cancel the August recess and keep Congress in Washington to get our work done for the American people.
The good news for Great Lakes Restoration is that the massive cut -- from the current $300 million down to $60 million -- adopted by the House subcommittee on Interior and Environment -- is not going to happen. Neither Democrats nor Republicans support it going forward.
Moreover, a growing coalition of us Great Lakes Democrats and Republicans are pressing hard for comprehensive legislation (H.R. 2773) to, among other things, formally authorize the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative into law, appropriating up to $475 million to address the environmental challenges we face. And I was pleased to work with Republicans like Rep. Shawn Duffy across the bridge in Superior, and Rep. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania, on our successful amendment to stop further raids on the Harbor Trust Fund. Good for Duluth Harbor and good for the entire Great Lakes System.
More positive news -- as our bipartisan coalition gains strength, we have already succeeded in convincing the full House Appropriations Committee to scrap the subcommittee recommendation of only $60 million, and boost Great Lakes Restoration funding back up to $210 million.
Unfortunately, the Committee earlier rebuffed Minnesota Congresswoman Betty McCollum's amendment to restore full funding to $300 million. But in the Senate, the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee has just recommended full restoration at that same $300 figure.
If the legislative process were operating normally, the House and Senate would settle the Great Lakes Initiative in conference committee, at worst probably splitting the difference. A significant cut, but not a killer.
But there is nothing normal or functional about today's House budget and appropriations process. In fact, it's become a train wreck as more and more moderate Republicans walk away from Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan's strategy of extracting deep cuts in domestic programs like the Great Lakes Initiative in order to generously fund Pentagon and military operations.
To that point, committee mark-up of the Interior Appropriations Bill -- Great Lakes Initiative included -- was abruptly halted before the August recess when Speaker Boehner realized the entire appropriations process was in serious trouble.
The situation became evident when the Majority couldn't muster the votes to pass the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development Appropriations bill on the Floor at the time. Moderate Republicans were balking because they believed the program cuts in the bill were too deep to pass muster with their own constituents. T-Party Republicans were balking because they viewed the cuts as not deep enough. So the Speaker has called "time out."
And as of today, the entire appropriations process, by which we fund the Great Lakes Initiative and the rest of our government, has ground to a halt. With only 9 scheduled legislative days left in September before funding for the entire federal government runs out on the 30th of the month.
So Congress is left with three possibilities:
1. Pass all remaining appropriations bills and get them through the Senate and conference committee to the President's desk in 9 days. This would require a major miracle.
2. Pass a customary Continuing Resolution to fund the government at current levels while we continue the appropriations process. Problem is, in order to support a Continuing Resolution, T-Party Republicans will say they insist on Congress de-funding the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). After 40 failed attempts to cripple or dismantle that law, the 41st is likely to meet the same demise.
3. Do nothing and, as leading T-Party Republicans have proposed, force the federal government to shut down. Think about that. No Social Security or Veterans benefits. Medicare in jeopardy. National Parks closed. The list goes on. What an unacceptable, unmitigated, unnecessary disaster that would be.
I don't know what will happen, but I hope we move toward option # 2 -- a bipartisan continuing resolution passed by moderate Republicans and Democrats who agree not to hold the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative and everything else hostage to an attempt to shut down the federal government.
But to the larger point, the 113th presently stands as the least accomplished Congress in modern memory. The American people deserve better. We need to restore more than the Great Lakes. We need to restore bipartisan cooperation and sanity in Washington.