Committee passes 19 bills in marathon markup

October 01, 2020

In an hourslong markup characterized by fatigue and partisan finger-pointing, members of the House Natural Resources Committee last night approved 19 bills — a combination of land transfers, monument designations and major policy overhauls.

There were moments of aisle-crossing comity, such as when Chairman Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.) praised his retiring counterpart, ranking member Rob Bishop (R-Utah), as a lawmaker with the courage of his convictions.

"While Mr. Bishop and I might disagree on some basic principles, he has consistently defended his principles the whole time that I have known him," Grijalva said, "and that is the highest compliment you can pay to any politician: consistency and hard work."

Bishop, in turn, quipped that he preferred working with Grijalva more when Republicans held the majority, and he told his colleague, "You are the only one I know who is much more sarcastic than I am."

And in a sign of how little appetite Republicans have for fights over the naming and placement of statues of Confederate leaders on federal lands, the committee was able to advance, by voice vote and with zero discussion, H.R. 970, from Rep. Anthony Brown (D-Md.), to require the National Park Service to remove a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee at Antietam National Battlefield; and H.R. 4135, from Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), to prohibit the display of a statue of Confederate Gen. Albert Pike at Judiciary Square in Washington.

Other debates, however, were contentious, such as what occurred over a proposal from Rep. Mike Levin (D-Calif.) that would overhaul the Bureau of Land Management's oil and gas leasing program.

The "Restoring Community Input and Public Protections in Oil and Gas Leasing Act," H.R. 3225, would increase the royalty rate for onshore oil and gas development from its current floor of 12.5% to no less than 18.5% (E&E Daily, June 21, 2019).

It would reduce lease sales to three times a year, rather than the current quarterly requirement, and prohibit the ability to remain anonymous when nominating land for lease to oil and gas development.

"Let's fight giveaways to the oil and gas industry and restore fairness to the American taxpayer," said Levin in his speech in support of the legislation yesterday.

It ultimately passed in a 20-15 vote, with committee Republicans opposing what they said was an attempt to simply undermine oil and gas exploration.

Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), who said the bill was "designed to make oil and gas leasing on federally owned land more difficult and [to] reduce domestic energy production," used the opportunity to force a vote on an amendment to prohibit hydraulic fracturing bans in states that want to support the practice.

Fracking has become a flashpoint in the 2020 presidential campaign for green advocates who are pushing former Vice President Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee, to promise to ban the practice (Greenwire, Sept. 1). The amendment was rejected, predictably, along party lines.

Rep. Garret Graves (R-La.) offered several amendments put forth as gestures of good faith, repeatedly saying he was seeking to improve the legislation.

A trio of amendments would specify that enactment of the bill would not result, respectively, in a net increase of greenhouse gases, loss of wildlife habitats or widespread blackouts and brownouts — noncontroversial changes that Graves said all panel members ought to support whether they are a "flaming liberal or rock hard conservative."

But Grijalva said that regardless of the amendments' intent, they were filed after the deadline and so should not be adopted at this time.

Graves was so miffed that he forced the committee, after 8 p.m., to take individual votes on each of his amendments rather than in a single en bloc package — a laborious undertaking given the panel was meeting largely in a virtual capacity to accommodate social distancing protocols put in place because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Proceedings were already running later than anticipated due to the fact that the committee had had to take two extended breaks to accommodate unrelated votes on the House floor.

"As your president famously said, 'Just stand by,'" Grijalva quipped, alluding to President Trump's instruction the night before to a group of white supremacists during the first presidential debate.

All of Graves' amendments were rejected, either by voice or roll-call vote, along party lines.

Mining legislation

Lawmakers yesterday also devoted nearly an hour to debating H.R. 5598, the "Boundary Waters Wilderness Protection and Pollution Prevention Act," which would reinstate and make permanent a 234,000-acre mining ban that blocked the Twin Metals project near Ely, Minn. (E&E Daily, Feb. 6).

Though the Obama administration imposed the mineral withdrawal to protect the Boundary Waters downstream, the Trump administration lifted the prohibition to give Twin Metals a chance to undergo an environmental review.

Since that time, House Interior and Environment Appropriations Chairwoman Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), along with Rep. Alan Lowenthal (D-Calif.), the chairman of the Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources, has led the crusade to uphold the Obama-era ban through congressional action.

Supporters of allowing the mining project to go forward argue that opponents from outside the district should not get to dictate the fate of an endeavor that will create jobs and benefit the local economy of a community that depends on the mining industry.

"It is the elite, liberal enclaves of the Twin Cities and the left and east coasts insulting my constituents in northern Minnesota by telling them that their way of life is somehow wrong or less valuable than others," said Rep. Pete Stauber, the Minnesota Republican who was just appointed to the Natural Resources Committee over the summer, whose district includes the proposed mine site and Boundary Waters.

"This bill is indicative of a chilling pattern where members legislate in places they don't represent simply because the wealthy elite and anti-mining, anti-jobs lobby, usually with the backing of some Hollywood elites, standing up on their soapbox, condemning our way of life," he added.

Stauber offered amendments intended to force Democrats into a box. One, rejected 19-16, would have prohibited a ban on the Twin Metals project if it meant relying on Congo for the extraction of cobalt, which uses child labor.

Another, rejected by voice vote, would have stopped a Twin Metals ban if it prevented the flow of new revenue to Minnesota schools.

Democrats were not impressed. "We're just being presented with one false choice after another," said Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.).

The committee passed the bill, 19-16, along party lines.

Voice votes

The following bills cleared the committee by voice votes:

  • H.R. 733, from McCollum, to transfer 11,760 acres of the Chippewa National Forest managed by the Agriculture Department to the Interior Department, to be held in trust for the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe and considered part of its reservation.
  • H.R. 1964, from Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), as amended in the nature of a substitute, would grant federal recognition to the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina.
  • H.R. 7099, from Grijalva, would permit a land exchange between the University of Arizona and the Department of Agriculture in the Coconino National Forest.
  • H.R. 1248, from Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine), would add more than 30 miles of the York River and its tributaries in Maine to the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System.
  • H.R. 244, from Rep. Chris Stewart (R-Utah), the "Advancing Conservation and Education Act," to maximize land management efficiencies, promote land conservation and generate education funding.
  • H.R. 3651, as amended, from Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb.), to lease 40 acres around the Missouri River Basin Lewis and Clark Visitor Center in Nebraska City, Neb., to help pay for the center's operations.
  • H.R. 4139, from Rep. Filemon Vela (D-Texas), to adjust the boundary of the Palo Alto Battlefield National Historical Park and to authorize the donation of land to the United States to add to that park.
  • H.R. 4840, as amended, from Rep. Tom O'Halleran (D-Ariz.), to increase the boundary of the Casa Grande Ruins National Monument in Coolidge, Ariz., by 200 acres.
  • H.R. 5153, as amended, from Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), the "Indian Buffalo Management Act," to create a program to conserve and protect bison herds.
  • H.R. 5458, from Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Colo.), to accept a donation of 40 acres to Rocky Mountain National Park.
  • H.R. 5459, also from Neguse, to approve a 0.18-acre land exchange in Rocky Mountain National Park.
  • H.R. 5472, from Rep. Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.), to change the Jimmy Carter National Historic Site in Plains, Ga., to the Jimmy Carter National Historical Park.
  • H.R. 5852, from Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), to redesignate the Weir Farm National Historic Site in Connecticut as a national historical park.
  • H.R. 7098, as amended, from Grijalva, to add 1,150 acres to Saguaro National Park in southern Arizona.
  • S. 212, from Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.), the "Indian Community Economic Enhancement Act," which the Senate approved on June 27.

By:  Emma Dumain
Source: E&E News