'SCOTUS before WOTUS': House Republicans rage over water rule

At a hearing aimed at the new

Republicans are united in their outrage over a newly finalized water regulation from the Biden administration and want agencies to wait until a key Supreme Court decision later this year to take further action.

Sparks flew during the House Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment hearing Wednesday, marking what is set to be the first of many acrimonious debates over the Biden administration's definition of "waters of the United States," or WOTUS. That rule laying out the scope of the Clean Water Act is considered critical for protecting the environment and public health, but has met furious resistance from ranchers, farmers and developers, who call it an act of government overreach.

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Other Democrats also summoned the specter of the prior pollution that led to the Clean Water Act's passage.

"Remember how we got here," cautioned Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.). "We had rivers that would catch fire and we couldn't put them out … Lake Erie and other water bodies were written off as dead and unable to support fish life because of pollution."

The lone witness for Democrats, professor Dave Owen of the University of California College of the Law in San Francisco, offered that the new WOTUS addresses problems posed by the Trump-era rule, which he said "mangled statutory texts" and imperiled drinking water.

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By:  E.A. Crunden
Source: E&E Daily

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