Rep. Huffman Slams McCarthy’s Last-Minute Effort to Attach Dangerous Provisions To Infrastructure Bill

December 05, 2016

Washington, D.C.- Congressman Jared Huffman (D-CA) today slammed House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s (R-CA) last-minute attempt to attach a nearly 100 page amendment to the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA). The amendment, first made public today despite months of negotiations on WRDA, would gut science-based environmental and clean water protections to benefit McCarthy’s own district, while threatening jobs across the West Coast’s multi-billion dollar salmon industry.

The news reports that Congressman McCarthy plans to attach a new subtitle to the Water Resources Development Act comes just days after Representative Huffman joined with other lawmakers from California, Oregon, and Washington in a letter to the White House Council on Environmental Quality, opposing legislative riders that would harm fishing communities across the West Coast.

“There they go again. Today’s attempt by Kevin McCarthy to attach dangerous California water provisions to WRDA is simply the latest effort to pick winners and losers during a drought, overriding science to redirect water into the hands of the most powerful corporate farmers in the world – and it won’t be the end of it,” said Rep. Huffman. “This same last-minute closed-door water grab nearly torpedoed last year’s must-pass spending bill. By insisting on this parochial poison pill, the Majority Leader is apparently willing to risk tanking the WRDA bill– no matter the damage done to the families in Flint, no matter the harm to fishing communities across the West, no matter how many jobs that would be created under WRDA that will have to wait until the McCarthy rider is dealt with. Anyone that participates in this charade should be ashamed. This is a slap in the face to all of us who want to enact good infrastructure policy, who have been working to deliver for the families of Flint, and whose states care about salmon fishing jobs.”

You can read Congressman Huffman’s letter to White House CEQ Managing Director Christy Goldfuss here.

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