[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 142 (Thursday, September 22, 2011)]
[House]
[Page H6349]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




             EPA'S ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE INTERNSHIP PROGRAM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Kansas (Mr. Pompeo) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POMPEO. Madam Speaker, I came to Washington, D.C., 9 months ago 
with the hope that we would restore a little bit of common sense and a 
whole lot of spending control to Washington, D.C. I also came to 
Washington, D.C., having never heard of an eco-ambassador. Now I had 
heard of ambassadors and I am familiar with the environment, but I had 
never heard of an eco-ambassador.
  Indeed, I had never heard of an eco-ambassador until just a few short 
weeks ago when our Environmental Protection Agency that has done so 
much damage to our economy, so much damage to our Kansas' Fourth 
Congressional District, our farmers, our manufacturers, and our 
families, our Environmental Protection Agency decided at this time of 
massive Federal deficits that we needed a new program to create eco-
ambassadors--eco-ambassadors, each of which will be given $6,000 of 
your money, eco-ambassadors which, in exchange for that money, will 
come to Washington, D.C., and go back to their home places and work for 
20 weeks--20 weeks for $6,000--part-time at that--for their internship 
program.
  When you read the requirements to be eligible to receive an eco-
ambassador internship position, you will be fascinated to see that it 
is an ideologically driven program. Students who apply must have a 
strong interest in environmental justice, social justice issues, and 
other issues relating to environmental health disparities in health, 
volunteer, or employment settings. This is a liberals-only policy.

                              {time}  1020

  The Environmental Justice internship is of course administered with 
your taxpayer dollars. We don't need a program like this at any time; 
we certainly don't need it at this time.
  So I have offered a bill, H.R. 2876, the EPA Student 
Nondiscrimination Act. It simply says that when you apply for 
employment with the Federal Government, we're not going to seek to find 
out whether you agree with this administration's radical environmental 
agenda. We're not going to seek to find out if you have worked as a 
community organizer. All we're going to ask is that you are qualified 
for the position.
  Now, there are many efforts and many concerns about environmental 
disparities across the country. I share those concerns, but our EPA and 
our Justice Department already have many remedies for folks who feel 
like they have been discriminated against. What we don't need is yet 
another Federal program aimed at trying to solve a problem that we know 
can't be solved in Washington, D.C.
  I'll close with this thought: this is a small program. The total 
dollars expended in the scale of our massive Federal deficit are very, 
very small; but it is symptomatic of a place, Washington, D.C., that 
has become completely disconnected from America and commonsense values, 
the values that we all have in Kansas. We don't need eco-ambassadors. 
We don't need this program. And I would ask my colleagues to support my 
legislation to eliminate it.

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