Providing for Congressional Disapproval of a Rule Submitted by the Environmental Protection Agency

Floor Speech

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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, it is a pleasure and privilege to follow the distinguished Senator from Indiana. His concerns for national security are well established, and I enjoy working with him, particularly in the area of cyber security. But I would note, in the wake of his eloquent remarks about our national security situation, that we are not here on the floor to discuss national security. We are here on the floor right now because the Republican leadership is taking a run at the President's Clean Power Plan.

Paris has not recovered from the devastation of the other day, and we have important bills that the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations has worked very hard on to get ready and that would improve the capacity of our Department of Justice, our FBI, and our Department of Homeland Security to address this threat. Are we on those bills? No. The majority leader has decided we are going to take a run at a climate regulation.

Now, with ISIS and terrorism being the issue of the day, one might think: OK, I can understand why we are going to climate change. We have known for years that our intelligence community, our defense leaders, and the men and women in uniform we count on to protect us have said climate change breeds terrorism. It creates the conditions--the Quadrennial Defense Review and the intelligence reports have said--that spawn the kind of despair that leads to terrorism. It is a catalyst of conflict.

So one might say: OK, sure, it makes sense we should address climate change because it is a catalyst for conflict. And we would find voices--I think the distinguished Senator from Indiana mentioned Admiral Stavridis. We love Admiral Stavridis in Rhode Island because he has been associated with the Naval War College. He has said that the cascading interests and broad implications stemming from the effects of climate change should cause today's global leaders to take stock, and he has said many other eloquent things on climate change too. But we are not here to do something about climate change and help reduce it as a catalyst of conflict.

What the majority leader has brought us here to do is to undo American leadership in this area.

One might say: OK, they have a better plan. The Republicans have a plan they think is better than the Clean Power Plan, and therefore they want to foul up the Clean Power Plan so they can put a clean power plan of their own in place. There is no such thing. There is no Republican strategy to deal with climate change. In fact, a majority of my colleagues on that side can't even admit that it is real.

So that is where we are. We are on a measure that clearly won't pass under the Congressional Review Act, clearly will go to the President and be vetoed and be sustained on the veto. So this will never become law. It is just a big exercise in time-wasting.

While the smoke is still clearing over Paris, we are still engaged in this big exercise in time-wasting. Why? To send a signal. To send a signal to the big coal interests, the big oil interests, the Koch brothers, and the tea partiers that ``We are with you.'' The American public isn't with you. Even Republicans aren't with you. If we look at recent polling, other than the tea party--and by the way, 70 percent in the tea party thinks global warming isn't happening--isn't happening. I don't know whom they are talking to. They are not talking to fishermen in my State. They are not talking to foresters out West. They are not talking to farmers in the Midwest. It is happening. We might go further as to discussing what to do about it, but the tea party is so irresponsible that they think, in a strong majority, it is not even happening. But they are not the ones we should be listening to because 83 percent of Americans--including 60 percent of Republicans--and by the way, with the November elections coming up, 86 percent of Independents say that if nothing is done to reduce emissions, global warming will be a very or somewhat serious problem in the future. So we are now going against what 83 percent of Americans, including 61 percent of Republicans and 86 percent of Independents, would direct us to do, in order to keep the faith with the big coal and oil and Koch brothers industries that fund so much of this operation here.

So 56 percent of Republicans--and 54 percent of conservative Republicans--say that the climate is changing and that mankind is contributing a lot or probably a little to the change. A majority of Republicans now believe there is solid evidence of global warming--again, 56 percent. When we look at young Republicans, this is where it gets very interesting. Young Republicans--under the age of 35--think climate denial by politicians in Congress is ``ignorant, out of touch or crazy.'' That is where young Republicans are on this.

Yet the majority leader has brought us here to interrupt any conversation we might be having over national security, slowing down any progress on the domestic security appropriations bills that might go forward, against the interests of young Republicans and everybody else virtually across the country, all to help out Big Coal, Big Oil, the Koch brothers, and to cater to this small, little tea party contingent, 70 percent of whom don't even believe climate change is happening. There is a point where you can't take views seriously. Frankly, if this group by 70 percent thinks it is not even happening, there is a point where we have to say: Run along, fellows; we want to play with the grownups here who understand what is going on.

So here we are on this bill. I will say that I like to do a little research when there is somebody speaking on the Senate floor. I thought the Senator from Indiana was going to talk about climate change, so I did home State Indiana, university, and climate change, to see what comes up. What came up was an article published by the University of Indiana that says ``Indiana University experts comment on climate change report.'' That is the headline. The No. 1 lead under it is ``Changing climate will affect Midwest crops, forests, public health.'' That is the lead, Indiana University. The second lead is ``Report signals need to move away from fossil fuels.'' So they get it at the University of Indiana.

Here is the quote: ``Climate change, once thought to be a problem for future generations, `has moved firmly into the present. ..... ' '' That was an article from May 6, 2014, more than a year ago, and still we are on the floor fighting about vain and doomed-to-failure efforts to attack the only climate change plan that is out there.

I invite my Republican colleagues: If you have a better plan than the climate plan the President has put forward, let's hear it. But I am here to say they have nothing--nothing--zero. So bring up that subject if you want. Highlight for the American people that this is a party in tow to coal and oil and Koch brothers' interests. Highlight for the American people that you are running in direct opposition to what the American people believe, to what even young Republicans believe. I don't get it, but have fun with it.

The last thing I will mention is this. I am from the Ocean State. I am about to be followed by my distinguished colleague and friend from Wyoming. Rhode Island has a little bit of a different situation. We are on the ocean. This denial business really doesn't work for us. We can go down to Narragansett Bay and measure that the bay is 3 to 4 degrees warmer, mean water temperature, than it was 30 years ago. That is not just a statistic; that signals the end of the winter flounder fishery in Rhode Island. We used to catch winter flounder. It was a robust crop. It is gone, more than 90 percent wiped out, largely because that warming has changed the ecosystem in which the winter flounders grew. So it is gone. We paid a price for that.

We can go to Naval Station Newport and look at the tide gauge. It is up 10 inches since the hurricane of 1938 came through. Google ``Hurricane of 1938, Rhode Island.'' Take a look at the images. We got smashed by that hurricane, and now there are 10 inches more water that can stack up with storm surge into an even bigger cocked fist against my State. That is directly related to the warming oceans--unless somebody wants to repeal the law of thermal expansion around here. But I don't think we get to do that in the Senate. That is one of God's laws. That is one of the laws of nature.

So our seas are warming, and our seas are rising. We have virtually lost our winter flounder fishery. We are losing our lobster fishery. We are getting clobbered, and we can't deny this stuff. The effect carbon has on the oceans can be replicated in a high school science lab. Ramp up the carbon dioxide in saltwater and seawater and it turns acidic. The ocean is turning acidic at the fastest rate ever since humankind has been on this planet.

Go to the western coast and look at a little tiny sea snail called the pteropod, the sea butterfly. God's evolution has metamorphosed this little snail to having a foot that is actually a wing that swims it through the ocean. It is one of the core species. If we had good ocean sense here, everybody would know what a pteropod was. It is all over the place. It is a huge food source. It is the bottom floor of the food pyramid.

In the study just done, more than 50 percent of the pteropods in the Pacific from California north had severe shell damage--more than half of the species had severe shell damage from acidification of those seas. People in Oregon and Washington have had their oyster farms wiped out as the acidified water came in and ate away the shells of these little creatures. You do not survive long in an environment in which you are soluble, and that is the predicament we are creating for these of God's species.

Pope Francis said something very simple: We don't have that right. We don't have that right. Those pteropods aren't this generation's species. They are God's species. They are the Earth's species. It is not for us to tell our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren: We don't care. Go ahead, die right out. We are going to protect our big industry friends. That is just wrong.

We should not be on this bill. This is a time-waster. This is a disgrace. This has no business being here. The American people know better, and that may be the reason we are trying to get off it as quickly as we can. But I am here to say it is not enough to get off trying to knock down our one plan for dealing with climate change; we ought to be thinking about how we enhance wind and solar in Texas, wind and solar in Wyoming, protect the great forests of this country, protect the great shores of this country, and protect the species offshore. We are changing their world on them by making the oceans more acidic than they have been in the lifetime of our species.

I know the Senator from Wyoming is here to rebut everything I have said, but he has that right.

I yield the floor.

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