Republicans criticize Judge for support of EPA water rules

CEDAR RAPIDS - A Republican-leaning advocacy group criticized Democratic U.S. Senate hopeful Patty Judge for her support of Environmental Protection Agency rules regulating Iowa waterways.

The EPA's WOTUS - Waters of the United States - rule is a 'massive federal overreach that is misguided, places the increased burden of government red tape on farmers and landowners, and impedes our efforts to improve water quality through Iowa's innovating nutrient reduction strategy,” her successor at the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, Bill Northey, said Tuesday.

Judge, one of four candidates for the Democratic nomination to face Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley in the November general election, said the WOTUS rules are 'on target.”

'We are now at a crisis point. We have to address water quality and we have to do that very soon … and the EPA is going to have to be a part of the solution,” she said Tuesday on Iowa Public Radio's 'River to River.”

Northey said during a phone call with Iowa reporters that was arranged by Priorities for Iowa that her position is 'certainly disappointing” because as a former Iowa Secretary of Agriculture he would expect her to understand how devastating the rule will be.

It's not a partisan issues, according to Jimmy Centers, the group's executive director and former spokesman for GOP Gov. Terry Branstad. All six members of the Iowa congressional delegation, including 2nd District Democratic Rep. Dave Loebsack, have opposed the rules.

'Unfortunately, Patty Judge, a candidate that was hand-picked by the Washington elite, would rather align herself with the EPA and President Obama instead of standing up for Iowans,” Centers said.

Judge acknowledged that her position is at odds with many in the agricultural community.

'I know a lot of my agricultural people, my farm friends, don't agree with me on that, but again, we are at a point where we are going to have to be serious about improving water quality,” she told the Des Moines Register.

Judge doesn't believe the EPA intends to 'regulate ditches and mud puddles in Iowa,” her spokesman Sam Roecker said. 'If that needs to be clarified in the language of the rule, she is certainly open to that, but we can't keep kicking the can down the road on water quality in this state.”

If Judge is concerned about water quality, Northey said, 'She certainly should embrace this effort, this innovative Iowa-based solution, not the bureaucratic nightmare that a WOTUS would be.”

Judge is in a four-way primary with former state legislators Tom Fiegen and Bob Krause, and State Sen. Rob Hogg. The primary election in June 7.