Blumenthal helps found Oceans Caucus

Sen. Richard Blumenthal will be among the founding members of a new Senate Oceans Caucus, which is having its first meeting on Tuesday.

The bipartisan group of senators will outline their priorities at a press conference after Tuesday’s organizational meeting. But in a media advisory, the new group said that oceans and their coastal ecosystems are under “constant and increasingly grave threats,” as are the jobs that oceans support.

So the environmental and economic dilemmas stemming from ocean-related issues will be clearly make up the bulk of the Caucus’s agenda.

In addition to Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, the other members include: Mark Begich and Lisa Murkowski, a Democrat and Republican, respectively, from Alaska; Scott Brown, a Republican from Massachusetts; Maria Cantwell., a Democrat from Washington; Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, and Mary Landrieu, a Louisiana Democrat.