(Washington DC) After today's vote in the U.S House of Representatives to undermine the federal responsibility for protecting clean water, Clean Water Action pledged to hold elected officials accountable for this vote.

"Congress passed the landmark Clean Water Act in 1972 because they knew that dirty water harms people's health, undermines strong economies and kills jobs," said Clean Water Action President Bob Wendelgass. "This bill is a vote to return to the days of inadequate state and local laws that led to rivers on fire and streams running with untreated sewage."

The U.S. House approved the "Clean Water Cooperative Federalism Act of 2011" (H.R. 2018) by a vote of 239-184. Written in response to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) actions around specific mountaintop removal coal mining and nutrient pollution problems, the bill severely limits the long-standing federal responsibility for keeping water protection consistent across all states. However, as the Congressional Research Service which provides objective policy analysis to the U.S. Congress noted, "it is highly unusual for Congress to advance legislation that would broadly alter the federal-state partnership in order to address dissatisfaction with specific actions by EPA or another agency."

Today's House vote comes in the context of unprecedented attacks on federal programs that protect public health and natural resources, including but not limited to critical EPA functions under the Clean Water Act and Clean Air Act.

Clean Water Action pledged aggressive grassroots campaigns to defeat HR 2018 in the Senate and to defeat those Members of Congress who voted for the bill, in the fall 2012 elections. "Almost half of the members of the U.S. House of Representatives represent states where Clean Water Action has active programs, " said Wendelgass. "We intend to make sure our members' voices are heard in favor of strong protections for our water and our health."