Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2019

Floor Speech

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Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Chair, I thank the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Nolan) for yielding me the time.

Talk about working hard, you are here at 9 o'clock in Washington and the day started very early.

I thank the gentleman for being here and defending the Great Lakes. I support his amendment. I personally represent about 200 miles of Lake Erie's coast, the shallowest and most abundant of the Great Lakes. We know what zebra mussels are and quagga mussels. We also know about aquatic plants like phragmites that are just invading and causing all kinds of problems along our shores.

The Aquatic Nuisance Species Research Program works on other species in other parts of the country, so I thank the gentleman for being a champion of the Great Lakes and a champion of so many important causes.

We know that in our Great Lakes we have about a $6 billion fishery that we are trying to protect, but these quagga and zebra mussels are spreading rapidly. The gentleman is right. It is just an explosion. There is no other way to explain it. They came in in ballast water. We tried to adopt ballast water regulations so it has to be dumped when it is further up the Saint Lawrence Seaway before those ships come down. It didn't happen, so now we have this to contend with.

We are trying to keep these invasive species out of our lakes. We are threatened by the Asian carp. We are trying to fish those out temporarily while we try to find a more genetically impactful solution.

I want to thank the gentleman for transferring $1 million from the Corps' operation and maintenance account to increase the Corps' Aquatic Nuisance Species Research Program. I commend the gentleman for that and thank him for working so late into the night.

Your constituents are lucky Congressman Nolan is here.

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