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House narrowly passes debt ceiling legislation
House Republicans narrowly passed H.R.2811, or the Limit, Save, Grow Act of 2023, passing a debt ceiling bill on to the Senate and setting up a potential government shutdown showdown. According to some sources, the bill is un-
likely to make it to President Biden’s desk but will draw Democrats to the negotiating table. For the irrigation industry, the Limit, Save,
Grow Act of 2023 would impact several pro- grams important to the industry, according to the Irrigation Association’s Nathan Bowen, ad- vocacy and public affairs vice president. “While it is critical for Congress to address the debt limit, the cuts included in the LSGA would represent significant challenges for our industry,” says Bowen. “In particular, the caps on discretionary spending in the bill would dramatically reduce funding for important re- search and rural broadband programs.” Bowen says that farm bill negotiations and debt ceiling negotiations are intertwined and are setting up lawmakers for heated debates. “While the specific bill passed by the House is dead on arrival in the Senate, the political brinkmanship around the debt ceiling has the potential to not only impact federal spending levels, but also negotiations on the farm bill,” says Bowen.
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Close but no cigar: WOTUS veto override fails in the House
Te House of Representatives failed to reach the 2/3 majority necessary to overturn Presi- dent Biden’s veto of
H.J.Res.27, a joint resolu- tion that would nullify the rule titled “Revised Definition of ‘Waters of the United States.’” Te WOTUS rule is currently legally
enforceable in 24 states, with the rest of the country currently exempt from the rule. Te exemption is the result of a decision hand- ed down from North Dakota District Court Judge Daniel Hovland, who granted the pe- tition for preliminary injunction, prohibiting the enforcement, implementation or applica- tion of the rule. “Despite the fact that we were not sur-
prised that the veto override effort failed, we are confident that the saga of federal Clean Water Act jurisdiction is far from over,” says Nathan Bowen, Irrigation Association advo- cacy and public affairs vice president. “Tere are pending lawsuits in many jurisdictions that continue to work their way through the feder- al court system, and the imminent Supreme Court decision in Sackett v. EPA. Tose all have the potential to dramatically impact fed- eral water jurisdiction and irrigators around the country.”
Reclamation publishes two water allocation options for Colorado River
Te Department of Interior, Washington, D.C., released a draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement April 11 with the intention of supplementing the 2007 Interim Guidelines for Colorado River Basin management and “to modify guidelines for operation of Glen Can- yon Dam and Hoover Dam to address histor- ic drought, historically low reservoirs and low runoff conditions.”
Te document outlines two options for re- ducing demand on the river and ensuring that the Bureau of Reclamation “has the tools to protect continued water deliveries and hydro- power production for the 40 million Americans who rely on the Colorado River.” Te first outlined option would allocate wa- ter based on the priority of water rights. Te second would cut allocations evenly across the three lower basin states, including California, Arizona and Nevada, under shortage condi- tions. Te proposal would reduce those totals across these states by as much as 13% over what they had already agreed to through a model re- leased by six states in January. “Drought conditions in the Colorado River
Basin have been two decades in the making,” says Camille Calimlim Touton, Bureau of Rec- lamation commissioner.
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irrigationandlighting.org
June 2023 Irrigation & Lighting 43
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