The Udall-Eisenhower Arctic Wilderness Act

Floor Speech

* Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, 50 years ago, on December 6, 1960, President Dwight D. Eisenhower set aside the core of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. In so doing, President Eisenhower began the bipartisan legacy of protecting this majestic national treasure. 20 years later, in 1980, Representative Mo Udall succeeded in doubling the size of the Refuge.

* Now it is time that we finish the job these great Americans began 50 years ago. Now it is time to permanently protect the Coastal Plain. The Congress needs to pass legislation designating it as wilderness.

* If we don't enact permanent protections for the Refuge, oil companies and their allies in Congress will continue to push for short-sighted plans to drill one of our last pristine wild places.

* Just last year, the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster led to more than 4 million barrels of oil spilling into the Gulf of Mexico. It was the worst oil spill in the history of the United States. The blobs of oil washing up on Gulf beaches recalled the ghosts of Valdez, and of Santa Barbara.

* As we learned from the BP oil spill, the oil companies are prepared to drill ultra-deep, but they are not prepared to do it ultra-safe. Or respond ultra-quick.

* What we did discover is that their response plans for a Gulf oil spill included plans to evacuate walruses from the warm waters off Louisiana, even though they had not called the Gulf home for 3 million years.

* This disaster was born from boosterism from the oil industry. Boosterism led to complacency. And complacency led to disaster.

* When it comes to the Arctic Refuge, we've heard the same boosterism for years. The oil companies and their allies repeat a list of talking points: Drilling has a small footprint. It will not spoil habitats. Drilling can be done in an environmentally safe manner.

* Now the oil companies and their allies want to open the Refuge and undo 50 years of protections and eons of solitude, all for less than a couple pennies at the pump more than two decades from now.

* Instead of looking for the last drops of oil on Earth, we should be harnessing the wind and the sun to power our economy and create new, safe American jobs.

* And unlike an oil well, you don't need a blowout preventer on a solar panel. There's no such thing as a ``tragic wind spill.''

* When we look upon the Refuge decades from now, will we see a monument to America's commitment to our natural heritage, or will we see the abandoned wells and spilled oil as a monument to our insatiable thirst for oil? Will the Refuge remain a monument to America's wisdom or will our children and grandchildren only be able to see polar bears, caribou and other iconic animals carved in stone, monuments to our lack of foresight and innovation?

* Now is the time to create a refuge for the American people from hundreds of billions of dollars we spend every year on foreign oil. Now is the time to create a refuge from the fossil fuel policies that have devastated the economy of the Gulf. Now is the time to protect the Arctic Refuge.

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