Trump Begins Roll Back on WOTUS
President Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday to roll back the Obama Environmental Protection Agency's highly-criticized 'Waters of the US' rule, fought by agriculture, homebuilders and local and state governments in the courts and Congress for years.
The President, surrounded by farm leaders, builders, lawmakers and county commissioners, and flanked by his new EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt—an avid WOTUS opponent— ended what many consider a long regulatory 'nightmare.
Trump: "EPA's so-called Waters of OTUS rule is one of the worst examples of federal regulation and it has truly run amoke and is one of the rules most strongly opposed by farmers, ranchers, and ag workers across the land."
President Trump pointed out the Clean Water Act was only intended to regulate navigable waters...until the EPA decided a few years ago that such waters can mean any puddle or ditch on a farmer's land or anywhere else. The President called it a "massive power grab" that put hundreds of thousands of people out of work, and treated farmers and ranchers as if they were a "major industrial polluter".
Trump: "They treated them horribly, horribly. If you want to build a new home, for example, you have to be worried about getting hit with a big fine if you fill in so much as a puddle - just a puddle — on your lot. I've seen it. In fact when it was first shown to me, I said, 'You're kidding, aren't you?'. But they were not kidding."
