Natural Resources leaders spar over mine permitting plans

Republicans on Wednesday announced an investigation into Bureau of Land Management proposals.

May 29, 2024

House Natural Resources Republicans are probing whether the Interior Department flouted federal law and sidestepped public scrutiny when proposing new metrics for assessing mine approvals. Democrats are already calling the investigation a sham.

Chair Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.) and Reps. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), chair of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, and Pete Stauber (R-Minn.), chair of the Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources, are questioning the Bureau of Land Management’s decision to publish the documents on its website and not the Federal Register.

BLM sought comment on the metrics — including ways to measure early coordination and the length of National Environmental Policy Act reviews — through March 13. The agency later extended the comment period through April.

But Republicans, in a letter Tuesday to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning, said officials should have published the metrics in the Federal Register, according to the Administrative Procedure Act, and that any comments should have been made public.

"The BLM’s request for comment on draft metrics through unofficial channels indicates a troubling pattern of the Biden Administration’s failure to adequately and transparently consider public input on proposed regulations in the mining sector, as illustrated by the [interagency working group] report,” the Republicans wrote.

The Interior Department declined to comment when asked about the letter. Top committee Democrats immediately shot back at the investigation.

"The fact that Westerman and Gosar would feign outrage over something involving a pending rulemaking is really par for the course," said Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) in a phone interview. "It is much ado about nothing, just like the rest of their feigned outrage."

Huffman defended the administration as a group that "plays by the rules" and “does things by the book.” He knocked Republicans for ignoring Democratic requests to investigate the oil industry.

BLM's metrics are tied to a report the Biden administration published earlier this year — the final product of a high-profile interagency working group tasked with speeding up mining approvals and revamping the nation’s 151-year-old law that governs hardrock mining.

The group last year released a raft of 60 recommendations aimed at accelerating permitting while protecting vulnerable and sacred lands.

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By:  Hannah Northey, Garrett Downs
Source: E&E Politico Pro News PM