{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.sullivan.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/sullivan-criticizes-biden-admins-resuscitated-overreaching-wotus-rule", "Sullivan Criticizes Biden Admin\u2019s Resuscitated, Overreaching WOTUS Rule", "2022-12-30", "2022", "2022-12", "Republican", "Senate", "AK", "Dan Sullivan", "S001198", "www.sullivan.senate.gov", "sullivan", "https://www.sullivan.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases?PageNum_rs=26", "scraper", "ANCHORAGE, ALASKA\u2014U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska), a member of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, today released the following statement criticizing the Biden administration\u2019s recently-announced Waters of the United States (WOTUS) Rule under the Clean Water Act.\n\n\u201cThe Biden administration today announced its \u2018final\u2019 Waters of the United States (WOTUS) Rule, resuscitating the burdensome and overreaching Obama-era \u2018final\u2019 interpretation of the Clean Water Act and giving the EPA vast authority over lands across the country, particularly in Alaska, which has more wetlands than any other state in the country by far. Remarkably, the Biden administration refused to pause issuing this WOTUS Rule just a few months until the Supreme Court rules in a case (Sackett vs. EPA II) that will determine the scope of the agency\u2019s authority under the Clean Water Act. As a result, millions of hard-working Americans and Alaskans are left in regulatory limbo.\n\n\u201cUnder this rule, land owners face the potential for thousands of dollars in litigation and months of bureaucratic back-and-forth just to fill a ditch or build a structure on their own property. This rule abandons the balanced, bipartisan and statutorily-based implementation of the Clean Water Act that we had achieved working with the Trump administration, through multiple court victories, and through multiple field hearings I chaired as a member of the Environment and Public Works Committee\u2014including in Alaska.\n\n\u201cThe truth is, all Americans want clean water, and we have some of the country\u2019s cleanest water right here in Alaska. But the federal government should not take authority from states and run rough shod over the law, good-paying jobs, and our economy\u2014which is on the verge of a recession\u2014to achieve that goal. I will do everything I can to fight this illegal federal power grab, and I look forward to the Supreme Court once again reining in this out-of-control federal agency.\u201d\n\nBelow is a timeline of Sen. Sullivan\u2019s work on the WOTUS Rule.\n\nOn April 6 and April 8, 2015, Sen. Sullivan chaired Environment and Public Works Subcommittee field hearings in Anchorage and in Fairbanks on the impacts of the previously proposed WOTUS Rule on state and local governments and stakeholders.\n\nOn April 30, 2015, Sen. Sullivan, along with Senators John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.), Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.), Pat Roberts (R-Kas.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), introduced the bipartisan Federal Water Quality Protection Act (S. 1140) to direct the EPA and the Department of the Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) to issue a revised WOTUS Rule that protects navigable water from water pollution, while also protecting farmers, ranchers and private landowners.\n\nOn May 19, 2015, Sen. Sullivan chaired a subcommittee legislative hearing on S.1140 The Federal Water Quality Protection Act. This bill would have withdrawn the WOTUS Rule and required EPA to more appropriately define what bodies are \u201cWaters of the United States.\u201d\n\nOn October 9, 2015, Sen. Sullivan issued a statement on the nationwide stay of the EPA\u2019s previous WOTUS Rule.\n\nOn September 30, 2015, Sen. Sullivan chaired a subcommittee hearing titled \u201cOversight of the Army Corps of Engineers\u2019 Participation in the Development of the New Regulatory Definition of \u2018Waters of the United States.\u2019\u201d\n\nOn May 24, 2016 Sen. Sullivan chaired a subcommittee hearing titled \u201cErosion of Exemptions and Expansion of Federal Control \u2013Implementation of the Definition of Waters of the United States.\u201d\n\nOn February 28, 2017, Sen. Sullivan attended a meeting at the White House where President Trump signed an executive order that began to roll back the EPA\u2019s Waters of the United States (WOTUS) Rule.\n\nOn April 26, 2017, the EPW committee held an oversight hearing titled \u201cA Review of the Technical, Scientific, and Legal Basis of the WOTUS Rule.\u201d At the hearing, Chairman Barrasso called for the withdrawal of the fundamentally flawed rule. Witnesses testified that the 2015 WOTUS Rule is not supported by the Corps\u2019 experience and expertise, scientific studies, or the law.\n\nOn June 27, 2017, Senator Sullivan shared his views on the EPA\u2019s efforts to withdraw and rewrite the overreaching WOTUS Rule.\n\nOn September 27, 2017, Senator Sullivan, along with committee members Sens. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), John Boozman (R-Ark.), Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), Jerry Moran (R-Kas.), Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) and Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), sent a letter to the EPA and the Corps in support of the proposed withdrawal of the 2015 WOTUS Rule.\n\nOn December 11, 2018, the EPA and the Corps proposed a revised definition of the WOTUS Rule.\n\nIn January 2020, the EPA and the Corps issued a revised definition of the WOTUS Rule.\n\n# # #", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T18:41:06Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.sullivan.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/sullivan-criticizes-biden-admins-resuscitated-overreaching-wotus-rule"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.2181091587990522, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}