The EPA will provide clarity to the reach of the clean water law with revisions of the so-called Waters of the United States that was proposed by the Obama administration and blocked by court challenges, said administrator Scott Pruitt in a Cedar Rapids (Iowa) Gazette interview. Pruitt said the new rule would be “objectively measured and traditional in its view of how we should measure waters of the United States.”
Farm groups were leading opponents of the rule, proposed by the Obama administration. They said it would lead to federal jurisdiction of dry ditches in farm fields. Under Obama, the EPA said normal farming practices would be exempt from the rule and the rule offered the same protection to wetlands and tributaries as in the 1970s. More than a third of Americans, 117 million people, rely at least in part on drinking water from the water sources covered by WOTUS, according to the EPA.
Pruitt, who filed suit against the rule while Oklahoma attorney general, told the Gazette that farmers and landowners have a natural interest in maintaining healthy water and the environment: The greatest asset they have is the land.” Pruitt said he will visit 25 states to gather ideas for the new clear water rule.