May 24, 2019 — There’s likely going to be no more withering nor efficient criticism of the Trump administration’s coastal economic and environmental policy goals than U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman launched into at the outset of a U.S. House subcommittee meeting Tuesday.
The House Subcommittee on Water, Oceans and Wildlife met to discuss the administration’s fiscal year 2020 budgets for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The California Democrat said the Trump administration’s proposed budget shows the president “does not value oceans, wildlife or the communities that depend on healthy ecosystems.”
Huffman cited a $250 million cut to USFWS and a nearly $1 billion cut to NOAA. He said some Republican members of the subcommittee may find these cuts wise, though he did not.
“From climate change denial to a national debt that’s ballooning thanks to huge tax cuts to billionaires, to budgets like this that abrogate any notion of stewardship for future generations, young people today could be forgiven for thinking that the generation currently in power is reckless and hedonistic.”
U.S. Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., indeed did say the proposed cuts in the budget were not only the proper way to go, but should go further in consolidating perceived overlaps between NOAA and USFWS and cutting away more spending programs.