OCR’s Daniela Huson and Michael Stocker at the Capitol
OCR Communications Director Daniela Huson and I have just returned from a week in Washington DC – to participate in Capitol Hill Ocean Week, and March for the Ocean. But probably more importantly, we went to “a special place in hell” to do our part in trying to straighten a few things out.
We spent a couple of days “polishing the marble” – walking the halls of Congress to meet with staff members of Senate and House leaders to express our particular concerns, and ask how we might support ocean initiatives that their offices are advancing.
With the exception of 2017, I have been visiting DC every year since 2000. Each year is different; and as you might expect, there are significant variations in the policy atmosphere under differing administrations – tempered by the Majority/Minority bias of the legislature. There have been years where legislation and policies advance toward meaningful regulations, and other times where bills are submitted merely as strategic maneuvers with little meaningful policy outcomes.
This is one of the reasons it takes so long to get legislation through Congress; a significant percentage of the bills introduced are designed to expose and exploit political vulnerabilities of the opposite party, not necessarily in response to the needs of the public. Exacerbating this problem is something that sounds good on paper, but is really lousy in execution: “Transparency in Congress.”
This came to pass in the early 1970’s when the Congressional deliberation process was opened up to allow voters to see how their representatives were spending their time (and our money). But it also opened up the floor to lobbyists. Bigley. No longer could lawmakers safely “cut deals” to advance more nuanced legislation; rather Legislators became increasingly obligated to the pressures of partisan roadmaps and lobbyist’s money.
That being said, we were able to visit the offices of quite a few Senators and Representatives to advance issues that are currently not exactly up in committee – although they do intersect the ongoing disaster de jour – the Fossil Fuel coup. The advantage of our “over the horizon” strategy is that when Congress – especially staff, are informed about issues not at the controversial forefront of advancing bills, text addressing these concerns can get crafted (or folded) into legislation without raising adversarial eyebrows.
We did have a lot to say to Congressional Leaders about bills aimed at eviscerating the Marine Mammal Commission and the Marine Mammal Protection Act (The Sea Act HR 3133, and the Secure Act, H.R. 4239). But American voters love our marine mammals, so advancing these bills so close to the elections would be “ballot-box poison” for the Majority party.
But another stunt pulled off in the House was to conceal a number of anti-environment “riders” in the “must pass” National Defense Appropriations Act. Fortunately, the Senate version of the bill has none of these riders. So the word in the marble halls is that our beloved marine mammals and the agency that oversees their protection are safe – for now.
If you’d like to pitch in and make things better (and you are an American citizen), I’d advise getting connected with a phone bank of your choice in September-October and encourage potential voters to get out and vote, dammit!
Lobbying is not easy! If you are lucky enough to get a meeting, you have 5 minutes or less to make your case so the staffer your meeting with can wrap up the 50 or so meetings they have that day. Keep up the good fight Michael and Daniela!