Sponsors (7)
Official title: To prohibit the conditioning of any permit, lease, or other use agreement on the transfer of any water right to the United States by the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of Agriculture, and for other purposes.
Introduced January 9, 2025 by Celeste Maloy · Last progress January 9, 2025
The bill strongly preserves State-based water rights and existing contracts (providing legal certainty for states, farmers, tribes, and utilities) at the cost of limiting federal flexibility to impose uniform environmental, public-health, and coordinated regional water-management measures.
State and local water users (including state governments) retain primary control over water allocation and permitting, preventing new federal rules from overriding State water law.
Farmers, ranchers, and other local water users avoid new federal constraints on diversion timing, quantity, priority, or place of use, preserving existing uses and economic predictability for agriculture and rural communities.
Federally recognized tribes have their reserved and treaty water rights explicitly recognized and preserved, protecting tribal water interests and legal status under existing law.
Federal agencies may be blocked from imposing environmental or public-health protections that rely on recognizing surface–groundwater connections, potentially weakening water quality and health safeguards for communities.
National or interstate water management, coordinated drought response, and ecosystem-restoration efforts could be hampered if federal actions must defer to differing State laws, reducing ability to respond to regional water crises.
Explicitly including tribal water rights in the statutory framework could prompt disputes or litigation over priority and scope of rights, creating legal uncertainty for both tribal and non‑tribal water users.
Based on analysis of 5 sections of legislative text.
Bars federal agencies from conditioning permits or land-use approvals on transferring, impairing, or altering State-recognized water rights and requires deference to State water law.
Prohibits federal officials from conditioning land-use permits, leases, easements, rights-of-way, or similar federal authorizations on transferring, impairing, or otherwise changing State‑recognized water rights. The bill requires federal decisionmakers to defer to and coordinate with State water law, forbids imposing restrictions beyond State law (including treating surface and groundwater as connected contrary to State law), and protects State-adjudicated and State-recognized water rights including those of federally recognized Tribes. It also includes clauses saying the Act does not alter certain existing federal authorities or tribal reserved water and treaty rights, and does not affect Bureau of Reclamation contracts or interstate compacts and Supreme Court decrees resolving water allocations.