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Senate bill aims to uphold Navigable Waters Protection Rule

A bill introduced in the U.S. Senate aims to stop the Biden EPA from replacing the Navigable Waters Protection Rule with a new rule.

The legislation, sponsored by Virginia Senator Shelley Moore Capito and 31 colleagues would codify the Trump administration rule.

If replaced by the Biden administration, the lawmakers say it could be worse than the Obama-era Waters of the U.S. rule (WOTUS) by regulating ditches on private lands and converted croplands, inflicting “severe harm” on ag, construction and other areas of the economy.

Missouri Senator Roy Blunt, a co-sponsor, says the WOTUS rule would have put more than 99% of Missouri land under the jurisdiction of the EPA and Army Corps of Engineers and that’s why he fought so hard to have it replaced.

EPA is holding public listening sessions this month on a new definition. Administrator Regan says the goal is to listen to all sides and craft “an enduring definition of WOTUS.”