Katie, 

I wanted to provide you with an important update regarding the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's (USFWS) plan to expand the Muleshoe National Wildlife Refuge from 6,400 acres to 700,000 acres through land purchases and voluntary conservation easements.

Last week, the House passed the Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act (H.R.4821), which included my amendment to defund the USFWS' proposed expansion of the refuge.

I am now closely working with Senators Cruz and Cornyn to ensure my amendment gets passed out of the Senate and signed into law.

At a time when we have the highest level of indebtedness in the history of our nation, while we spend almost a trillion dollars in interest to service the debt, the last thing we need to do is spend money to buy up more land to somehow either appease an environmental group or maybe just achieve - what seems to be an odd objective - having the federal government own and operate a third of our land.

I spoke on the House floor to urge my colleagues to vote in favor of defunding this expansion and talk about why it's important to stand up for Rural America. You can watch my speech here:

I will continue to fight to defend West Texas against even a hint of federal overreach.