Ranking Members Larsen, Napolitano Statements from Roundtable to Examine Fallout from SCOTUS Sackett Decision

Hearing

"Thank you for joining today's discussion on the future of clean water in a post-Sackett world.

Clean water should not be a partisan issue.

Year after year, the protection of clean water for our families, for our communities, and for our environment ranks highest among American families for its public support.

That support only increases when access to clean water is threatened, such as through increased pollution, climate change and recurring drought.

I hope we can agree that our families and future generations should have the same access to clean water, regardless of zip code.

Yet, we often hear disagreement on how to protect clean water or who should pay to keep our waters clean, safe, and healthy.

For fifty years, the Clean Water Act has provided the framework for comprehensive and scientifically-grounded efforts to protect clean water.

The Clean Water Act was Congress' response to a failed state-led system where every state was given the ultimate responsibility for protecting its own waterbodies.

In essence, the Clean Water Act created a comprehensive, national program, carried out though a strong partnership between Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (the Corps), and the States.

The Clean Water Act ensured that each entity had a specific, complementary role to play in protecting clean water--and guaranteed consistent levels of protection for both upstream and downstream states.

The successes of the Act are clear--rivers no longer catch fire, and the streams and wetlands that are so crucial to the health of waterbodies have been protected against degradation or destruction.

Thanks to the Clean Water Act, waters are cleaner today than they were in 1972 and progress is continuing--although maybe not always as fast as we'd like.

Yet, in an apparent effort to serve their own conservative ideology, five members of the Supreme Court decided to ignore the law, to ignore the science, and to ignore over fifty years of success in protecting clean water in their Sackett decision.

Today, we'll discuss the implications of this decision and what this means for the future of clean water.

We should all be concerned with the potential impacts of the Sackett decision.

This ruling is likely to cause more damage to the protection of clean water than the Trump Dirty Water Rule--a failed effort that would have removed protection on 50% of our nation's wetlands and 70% of our nation's streams.

Some will say that the Court got it right and that everything will be just fine because states will simply do the right thing and fill in the gaps.

Yet, if the trend of the last few years continues, the battle for clean water may now be changing to the state and local level where polluters will continue their push to remove clean water protections at every chance.

And, unfortunately, this is not an academic issue, as every decreasing level of clean water protection comes at a cost.

A cost to our communities in terms of increased flooding, decreased water availability, or degraded water quality.

A cost to American families who will have to pay more for access clean water, if that water it is even available.

A cost to our economy and to the farmers, businesses, and industries that lose reliable access to clean water.

A cost to states and tribes who now must shoulder a greater burden without additional resources.

And a cost to our natural environment and our clean water future.

I want to recognize the Ranking Democrat of the Full Committee, Mr. Larsen, for any remarks he may have."

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