Ranking Member DeLauro Statement at the Full Committee Markup of the Fiscal Year 2027 Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Funding Bill

WASHINGTON — Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, delivered the following remarks at the Committee's markup of the fiscal year 2027 Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies bill:

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and to you Chairman Simpson, and Ranking Member Pingree.

I also want to thank the Committee staff, Rita Culp and Tyler Coe on the Minority, and Maggie Earle, Sarah Peery, Andrea Sparks-Ibanga, and Lucy Alford on the Majority. Many, many thanks for all the hard work that goes into these bills.

I oppose the bill we are considering today. It is a gift to corporate polluters, who would poison our communities in pursuit of even greater profits. It saddles cities, towns, and working families with higher utility bills. And it allows President Trump to continue raiding public funds to pay for his own vanity projects.

This bill cuts the EPA’s budget by $1.8 billion, or 20 percent. With that $1.8 billion in mind, that was the size of the slush fund that was being proposed so the president could get money out to whomever. This is a 20 percent cut to the EPA’s budget. It cuts the EPA’s enforcement budget nearly in half. This will substantially erode the agency’s ability to enforce the laws that help protect the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the ground that grows our food.

Last month, the Trump administration announced they were rolling back restrictions on “forever chemicals” in our drinking water – harmful contaminants that we know can weaken our immune system and lead to cancer, kidney disease, liver disease, and birth defects. But the Trump administration has decided that the commercial interest in continued pollution is more important than the public interest in clean drinking water.

Administrator Zeldin has abandoned much of the EPA’s responsibility, in my view. He has weakened restrictions on dangerous chemicals in our drinking water; on poisonous pesticides in our farming soil; on particulate matter in the very air we breathe. The cuts proposed in this bill would make his dereliction of duty permanent, so that when a new administrator steps in, who may believe the job of the Environmental Protection Agency is to actually protect the environment, they will be unable to do so.

There are also a number of policy riders in this bill which are designed to further chip away at the EPA’s ability to enforce regulations under the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and other laws governing hazardous waste. A safe and clean environment is something that we should all expect in the United States. It should not be a privilege that depends on your ZIP code.

At a time when more and more families are struggling with rising utility costs, this bill slashes funding for water infrastructure by $576 million – including an $86 million cut to states for projects that support clean drinking water and sanitary wastewater systems. Eliminating this support will saddle our communities with additional costs.

This bill also continues the President’s bizarre war on wind power by imposing additional fees on offshore wind projects, disincentivizing the production of new energy sources. Generating more energy is key to bringing down costs. And investing in clean energy is how we prepare for the future. But this administration is instead punishing clean energy companies that innovate while rewarding fossil fuel companies that pollute. 

The bill slashes funding for the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities by $72 million each – a 35 percent cut. It has been said that robust investment in the arts is the mark of any advanced society. The use of public funds for private ends, however, is the mark of a civilization in decline. 

In its current form, this bill allows the Trump administration to continue raiding public funds intended to support the arts and humanities top pay for a 250-foot Arch dedicated to himself. 

This funding is supposed to be for libraries and museums and historical sites – to educate the public and enrich our culture. But President Trump wants to use it for a vanity project twice the height of the Lincoln Memorial.

Last year, the Trump administration took $15 million from the National Endowment for the Humanities and earmarked it for the Arch. If my Republican colleagues objected to this use of funds, this bill was their chance to stop it. They chose not to, and that choice speaks volumes.

At a time when the American people are struggling to make ends meet, this bill makes the problem worse. It does nothing to bring down costs, while allowing the billionaires and big corporations, who have profited by polluting our communities, to get even richer. Meanwhile, the air we breathe and the water we drink gets less and less safe.

I encourage my colleagues to oppose this bill. We are all on this planet together, and we ought to take better care of it. I encourage my friends across the aisle to work with Democrats to craft a bipartisan bill that, in fact, protects the environment, keeps our communities safe and healthy, and helps bring down costs for working families. 

Thank you, and I yield back.

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