Eyeing gavel, Huffman vows 'completely different agenda'
Rob Hotakainen, E&E News reporter
Rep. Jared Huffman, one of the most liberal members of Congress, has a way of getting noticed.
Last November, the California Democrat announced he's a humanist who does not believe in God. A few months earlier, he waved an air gun at a subcommittee hearing to argue that loud sounds from seismic testing can hurt marine mammals. And just eight months ago, he took to Twitter to describe Education Secretary Betsy DeVos as "dumber than a bag of hammers."
In January, Huffman expects to be in the spotlight yet again when he gets a subcommittee gavel for the first time.
Huffman, 54, is among the many Golden State lawmakers set to wield more power in the new Congress. As he gears up to begin his fourth term, Huffman is in line to become chairman of the influential House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Water, Power and Oceans, the panel that oversees the nation's fisheries.
"You're going to see a completely different character and a completely different agenda," said Huffman, a former state lawmaker and environmental attorney from San Rafael, Calif. "The last several years, in every one of our subcommittees, the agenda has been driven by the fossil fuel industry and the mining industry. It has been a race to extraction and to compromise environmental laws for the benefit of industry — and that is no longer the agenda."
The subcommittee has broad jurisdiction over fisheries management and research, irrigation projects, the generation of electric power from federal water projects, interstate water issues, oceanography, and marine sanctuaries, among other things.
In an interview, Huffman said he'll resist any GOP efforts to weaken federal fishing laws and will seek to block the Trump administration from allowing more oil drilling and seismic testing in federal waters.
"That train can be stopped," Huffman said. "With a Democratic Congress, this overreaching on offshore drilling should be stopped in its tracks."
Huffman said he wants to defend the nation's primary fisheries law, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act. He said the 1976 law, which aims to end overfishing and rebuild depleted fish stocks, came under attack again this year in a GOP bill approved by the House.
"Several of the real pillars of Magnuson's success — the annual catch limits and the rebuilding time frames — were essentially gutted in the Republican bill," Huffman said.
In 2017, Huffman received a perfect score of 100 from Americans for Democratic Action, a liberal organization. As subcommittee chairman, he will replace the current chairman, Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.), who received a score of zero from the same group.
'Smartest guy in the room'
"I for one am delighted that the smartest guy in the room is going to run that subcommittee for a change," said Noah Oppenheim, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations.
Oppenheim said he expects to see little but "oversight on steroids" from Democrats in the first few months of 2019. "It'll be important to learn how deep the rot has set in at Interior," he said. "On the ocean side, say goodbye to offshore drilling plans and seismic air gun surveys."
You're going to see a completely different character and a completely different agenda.
Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.)
Huffman displayed his air gun at a subcommittee hearing last year after an industry representative testified that seismic surveying for oil and gas deposits was safe for animals. Huffman asked her whether she wanted to try speaking while he discharged the gun every 10 to 12 seconds, emitting sounds of up to 120 decibels.
"Do you think your testimony would benefit from that?" he asked.
Frank Knapp, president of the South Carolina Small Business Chamber of Commerce and a leading drilling opponent, said Huffman's rise would be good news for those who want to thwart the Trump administration's drilling plans on both the east and west coasts.
"He's in great position," Knapp said. "And he comes from a long tradition of politicians opposing offshore drilling on the West Coast. California has been a leader."
Huffman said he also wants Congress to have "a productive conversation about water" instead of fighting old wars.
"For the last six years, the Republican majority pretended that the solution to Western water shortages was gutting the Endangered Species Act and pitting farmers against fishermen," he said.
Huffman has a long track record on environmental issues, representing California's left-leaning 2nd District, which stretches from the Golden Gate Bridge north to the Oregon border.
Before getting elected to Congress, he led the California Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee; served on the Marin County Municipal Water District Board; and spent six years as an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, focusing on river and fishery restoration.
In 2012, Sierra Club California gave Huffman its Byron Sher Award for outstanding achievement in environmental protection, an award named after a former California state senator. The organization said it wanted to honor Huffman "for remaining true to the planet."
More science, less politics
In April, Huffman announced he was the co-founder of the new Congressional Freethought Caucus, which he said would promote "sound public policy based on reason, science and moral values," while protecting "the secular character of our government."
That came after he told a Washington Post reporter he was a humanist and a skeptic on matters of religion.
"I suppose you could say I don't believe in God," Huffman told the newspaper.
Huffman said that science, not politics, should govern the debate regarding fisheries laws next year.
He criticized the Trump administration's handling of the Gulf red snapper last year. NOAA Fisheries first set a three-day season in 2017, only to be overruled by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who extended the season by 39 days. Ross made the decision after recreational fishermen said the federal government's catch limits had become too stringent.
"It was a joke," Huffman said. "You just don't do it that way. That's politics, that's not fisheries management."
He said the extended season will now make it more difficult to give states greater control over management of the red snapper.
"You've got a fishery that was basically taken to the brink of extinction through mismanagement," Huffman said. "You've got stakeholders fighting with each other and states fighting with each other. It's a long way from the kind of cohesive stakeholder consensus that would allow the federal government to back away."
Huffman said he's excited to be part of the House majority for the first time in his congressional career, though it won't include his D.C. roommate, Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas). In an August tweet, Huffman called O'Rourke a "rock star" and predicted he would unseat Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, but O'Rourke fell short.
Huffman will, however, be part of a California delegation that promises to be among the strongest in the House, led by the presumed House speaker, Nancy Pelosi. Other likely Democratic committee chairs from the state include Maxine Waters as head of the Financial Services Committee, Adam Schiff as chairman of the Intelligence Committee, Zoe Lofgren leading the Administration Committee and Mark Takano in charge of the Veterans' Affairs Committee.
In March, Huffman defended Waters, responding on Twitter to President Trump's persistent claims that she and some others who opposed the president had low IQs.
"If you want to meet someone who has an actual IQ problem (as opposed to just being black), meet your Education Secretary Betsy DeVos — rich, white, and dumber than a bag of hammers," Huffman wrote, after watching her stumble during an interview on CBS's "60 Minutes."
'He is one of us'
Jeff Angers, president of the Center for Sportfishing Policy in Baton Rouge, La., said the new year will "bring opportunities for new friendships and positive policy changes" for recreational anglers.
"Luckily, Congressman Huffman is an angler — so he is one of us," Angers said, expressing hope "he will welcome the priorities of the sportfishing community and recognize the economic and cultural value of recreational fisheries."
On Capitol Hill, Huffman has already been portrayed as a lackluster fisherman.
During a subcommittee debate last year, Huffman accused Republicans of trying to "weaken or circumvent" the Magnuson-Stevens law, arguing it was successful and had resulted in a decline in overfishing.
That prompted a quick retort from Alaska Republican Rep. Don Young, who said: "I have to say to my good friend from California ... you don't want to catch any fish."
In the interview, Huffman said that's not true, noting he just went fishing last week on California's Trinity River.
"I fish all the time — and I would bet you dinner anyplace in Washington that I fish a lot more than Don Young," Huffman said.

https://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2018/11/16/stories/1060106411