Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. Chairman, my amendment tells the Environmental Protection Agency to follow the law and clearly establishes the view of Congress that the EPA cannot lobby on behalf of the waters of the U.S. rule, in violation of the Anti-Lobbying Act.

Over the past few years, the EPA has been pushing the limits of its statutory authority to the issue of the waters of the U.S. rule. Now, we have learned that, as part of their efforts to regulate every pond, stream, and ditch in America, the EPA may have violated the Anti-Lobbying Act to garner public comments in support of the proposed rule, even though the Department of Justice has consistently stated that the act prohibits Federal agencies from engaging in substantial grassroots lobbying.

In fact, The New York Times recently reported:

In a campaign that tests the limits of Federal lobbying law, the Agency orchestrated a drive to counter political opposition from Republicans and enlist public support in concert with liberal environmental groups and a grassroots organization aligned with President Obama.

The New York Times went on to say as well:

The most contentious part of the EPA's campaign was deploying Thunderclap, a social media tool that spread the Agency's message to hundreds of thousands of people, a ``virtual flash mob,'' in the words of Travis Loop, the head of communications for EPA's water division.

Mr. Chairman, this is unseemly. The EPA Administrator later used the skewed results as evidence of public support before Congress.

For this reason, my amendment is needed to make clear that the EPA shall not violate the Anti-Lobbying Act while pursuing the completion of the waters of the U.S.

I respectfully urge all my colleagues to support my amendment.

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Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for her comments.

It is the law, and that is all I am trying to substantiate, but I have read to you not from an organ of the conservative Republican Party side, but from The New York Times.

They also went on to say:

The architect of the EPA's new public outreach strategy is Thomas Reynolds, a former Obama campaign aid who was appointed in 2013 as an associate administrator.

He said this in relationship to flash mob tactics and the lobbying efforts:

We are just borrowing new methods that have proven themselves as being effective.

Mr. Chairman, it may be effective, but it is unseemly that EPA, an agency of the Federal Government, would violate the law in lobbying and trying then to show Congress through trumped up evidence that they have produced through lobbying the private sector that they have support for the waters of the U.S. rule.

Mr. Chairman, that is why I think we need to establish it here very clearly in this appropriations bill.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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