Latest news with #RyanZinke
E&E News
22-07-2025
- Politics
- E&E News
Burgum urges House GOP to target Biden-era energy policies
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum urged House Republicans in a meeting Tuesday morning to continue to roll back Biden administration energy policies — and largely glossed over the GOP megabill's energy provisions, according to multiple people in the room. Burgum's early morning speech at Republicans' weekly meeting was an opportunity for members to hear about the Interior Department's energy and natural resources priorities just weeks after Republicans passed their reconciliation bill and as Burgum takes a leading role in President Donald Trump's push to stymie wind and solar. House Republicans are leaving Washington later this week for a six-week recess in which they will work to highlight the One Big Beautiful Bill Act — including its energy and natural resources provisions — while under fire from Democrats who say the bill will increase energy costs and result in project cancellations and layoffs. Advertisement Burgum, meanwhile, is leading the Trump administration's National Energy Dominance Council and working to implement the policies in the megabill. Separately, because of a recent Trump executive order, he is now in charge of personally signing off on any action advancing solar and wind power projects under federal review. 'Priorities were our energy grid, critical minerals, vulnerability — clearly, this administration's priorities are showing that aspect of it — and then unwinding the last four years,' said Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.), who served as Interior secretary during the first Trump administration. 'On the EV side of it, rolling back credits for it and making sure that there's a [specific] place for solar,' Zinke said. 'It's just not going to power the AI side of it.' Members leaving Tuesday's meeting said Burgum pressed the importance of continuing to roll back Biden administration laws and regulations that favored renewables. Congress' Republican majorities have already used the Congressional Review Act and their reconciliation bill to repeal and rescind funds for dozens of clean energy and climate programs that Democrats approved in the last Congress. 'They're going back' and looking at Biden-era policies to target, Zinke said of the Interior Department. 'A lot of what they're doing is unwinding the last four years,' he said. Rep. Pete Stauber (R-Minn.), chair of the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources, said Burgum 'talked about domestic mining and energy independence and making sure that we reverse some of the disastrous pieces of legislation and rules brought in by the last administration.' 'We're working at light speed to try to reverse it,' Stauber said. Some members said Burgum discussed the ways in which the One Big Beautiful Bill Act supported the administration's 'energy dominance' agenda but that he did not dive into any specifics. House Natural Resources Chair Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.) said Burgum 'talked about the wins that were in the bill,' such as 'producing more energy.' He said the secretary's message was 'alluding to the ability to use the resources on our federal lands.' The reconciliation law contains provisions requiring more onshore and offshore oil and gas lease sales and provisions to support mining projects. It also includes language to fast-track approvals for certain fossil energy projects. Westerman noted that Burgum highlighted his proposal to develop a 'balance sheet,' or comprehensive inventory, of the United States' federal land and mineral assets. He has said the plan could potentially help maintain or improve the country's credit rating. House Republican Conference Chair Lisa McClain (R-Mich.), who hosted the meeting with Burgum, later told reporters that Republicans will use the upcoming August recess to sell the reconciliation bill's wins to constituents. The goal, McClain said, is to 'remind the Democrats that it's the Republicans that are actually unleashing American energy. You know, putting money back into our economy, making us energy-independent again.'
Yahoo
20-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
House committee signs off on delisting grizzly bear
Grizzly bear photographed in Yellowstone National Park on May 19, 2020. (Photo by Jim Peaco/National Park Service) The U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources on Tuesday narrowly voted in favor of delisting the grizzly bear from the Endangered Species Act, pushing legislation long sought by western state elected officials to the next step in the congressional process. House Resolution 281, the Grizzly Bear State Management Act of 2025, was introduced by Rep. Harriet Hageman, R-Wyoming, along with Montana's two Republican congressmen, Reps. Ryan Zinke and Troy Downing. The legislation directs the Secretary of the Interior to remove the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem population of grizzly bears from the Endangered Species Act, restoring a ruling by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued in 2017 during the first Trump Administration. That rule was later vacated by a federal circuit court, and the agency, under the Biden administration, reversed its stance and recommended the grizzly stay on the list, and under federal jurisdiction. 'The GYE grizzly population has exceeded the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's recovery goals for over two decades,' Hageman said during the committee's markup hearing. 'Since a mere 3% of species listed under the ESA have ever been delisted the ESA desperately needs a success story like the GYE grizzly bear. The grizzly is, in fact, the poster child for how the ESA has failed in terms of what it was intended to do and how it has actually been implemented.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX But Democrats on the committee pushed back against the bill, arguing that the proposal amounted to a political football and could jeopardize the continued recovery of the species. The court ruling that vacated the 2017 delisting rule cited the federal government's 'failure to consider long term genetic effects on other populations and concerns that the decision was driven by political pressure … instead of the best available science,' ranking member Rep. Jared Huffman, D-California, said. He said the decision continued the partisan game played with the ESA, ignored consultation with Native American tribes on a culturally significant species, and removed public input from the process. 'To legislatively delist the population located around Yellowstone in Wyoming, Montana and Idaho, from the ESA and then block judicial review, that is not going to lead us down the path of success,' Huffman added. 'That's going to lead us to some really unfortunate consequences.' Grizzly bears throughout the contiguous states were listed under the Endangered Species Act in 1975 when there were only an estimated 300 to 400 animals left in the wild. Currently, FWS estimates there are roughly 2,314 grizzlies living between Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and parts of Washington. During the last decade, a saga of proposed delisting actions, lawsuits and petitions have left the fate of grizzly bears overshadowed with questions. Montana previously petitioned FWS to delist the species in the GYE and the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem, centered around Glacier National Park and the Bob Marshall Wilderness, but the agency rejected the petition early this year. A similar petition from Wyoming was also rejected in the final weeks of the Biden administration. Instead, FWS proposed a new comprehensive approach to federal grizzly management, including consolidating grizzlies living in six distinct recovery zones into a single population. That move would have prevented sub-populations, such as the GYE, from being considered for delisting separately from the species as a whole. Montana officials derided that decision, with Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte, a Republican, saying the administration was embracing a 'scorched earth strategy,' in its final days. He added that he looked forward to working with the Trump administration on a new path forward. Rep. Zinke shared similar sentiments at the time: 'Thankfully the political hands pulling the strings at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are about to be fired and President Trump will no doubt immediately rescind this train-wreck decision.' Zinke briefly served as Interior Secretary during Trump's first administration, and was in office when the 2017 delisting was announced. Zinke's office did not respond to a request for comment about the committee's vote on the 2025 rule or questions about preventing judicial review. But Montana Sen. Steve Daines praised Tuesday's vote in a post on the social media platform X, formerly Twitter, that 'delisting the grizzly bear is long overdue.' Ahead of the committee vote, more than 50 conservation organizations signed onto a letter urging representatives to vote against the legislation. 'The grizzly bear populations in those locations are stable and growing, but conservationists remain concerned about the geographic and genetic isolation of those populations, the threat of increased human-induced mortality through hunting or predator control if they were delisted and management returned to the states of Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho, and the effects of delisting particular populations on grizzly bears in the rest of the lower-48 states,' the letter states. Chris Servheen, a retired FWS grizzly bear recovery coordinator who petitioned the federal government to consider managing grizzlies as a single population — the plan the agency put forth this year — said in a statement that the efforts to delist grizzlies by congressional actions ignored key components of the ESA. 'The current administration and Congress are working to defund grizzly bear science and monitoring, dramatically reduce funding for federal land management agencies in grizzly range, increase timber harvest and road building in grizzly habitat, and weaken or eliminate the fundamental laws that grizzly recovery depends on like the ESA, the National Environmental Policy Act and the United States Forest Service Roadless Rule,' Servheen said. 'At the same time, recreation pressure on public lands and private land development are accelerating rapidly in grizzly habitat putting even more stress on grizzlies. Congressional delisting while the cumulative impacts of these actions are ongoing is irresponsible and will result in immediate declines in grizzly numbers and range.' During the committee discussion, Rep. Hageman hammered home her argument that the reason environmental groups and previous administrations had pushed to keep the grizzlies listed was for 'controlling large swaths of land and water resources. It's that simple.' She said that both individual states, and the federal government, have limited resources to spend on issues like endangered species, and they should be allocated to where the need is highest. 'There are species that truly do need our protection and need the resources to be made available so that we can protect them and recover them,' she said. 'When we are wasting money on a recovered species, those are resources that cannot be used for that purpose.' Democrats proposed three amendments to the bill — one to require DOI to follow the new 2025 species assessment issued by FWS that considered all grizzlies in the lower 48 to be considered a single population; another to require more tribal consultation in management decisions for grizzlies; and a third that sought to strip out the prohibition on judicial review in the bill. All three amendments failed on party-line votes. On the discussion over judicial review, Hageman said the point of the bill is to carry out the purpose and intent of the Endangered Species Act, and removing the legal provision amounted to a 'gift to the radical environmental lobby.' 'Until the bear has returned to state control where it belongs, lawsuits and ever shifting recovery standards will stand in the way activist judges have stood in the way of delisting for far too long,' she said. Hageman added that when the grey wolf was delisted in 2011, during the Obama administration, a similar provision was put into that legislation. The committee voted 20-19 along party lines to recommend approval by the full House of Representatives. Huffman gave notice that he intended to file 'dissenting or minority views,' on the measure for the full chamber. Rep. Russ Fulcher, R-Idaho, and Rep. Pete Stauber, R-Minn, also cosponsored the legislation. Daily Montanan is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Daily Montanan maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Darrell Ehrlick for questions: info@ SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
29-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
5 House Republicans say they will vote against GOP megabill over public land sales
A group of five House Republicans says it will vote against the GOP's tax and spending bill over provisions in the Senate version that would mandate the sale of land owned by the federal government. 'We support the OB3 passed by the House and generally accept changes to the bill that may be made by the Senate. However, we cannot accept the sale of federal lands that Senator [Mike] Lee seeks,' wrote GOP Reps. Ryan Zinke (Mont.), Mike Simpson (Idaho), Dan Newhouse (Wash.), Cliff Bentz (Ore.) and David Valadao (Calif.). 'If a provision to sell public lands is in the bill that reaches the House floor, we will be forced to vote no,' they added. Zinke has publicly said he would not support the bill if it mandates the sale of public lands, but a group of five would be enough to actually prevent the bill from passing, since Republicans can only afford to lose three House votes if every Democrat remains opposed as expected. 'It is our hope that the Senate Parliamentarian strips any language from the bill regarding public lands sales, but we hope we can count on you once again to hear our concerns and work with Senate Leadership to remove the provision that will tank the entire Republican agenda,' the quintet said in their letter, which was addressed to Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.). Republicans are seeking to pass their bill through a process known as budget reconciliation, which allows some measures to pass through the Senate with a simple majority, evading the filibuster. The parliamentarian, who acts as the Senate's referee on what can pass through reconciliation, has already rejected a proposal from Lee to sell off public lands. However, Lee has said he would try again to pass a narrower set of public land sales. Text obtained by The Hill indicates that the revised plan would still sell of 1.2 million acres. While controversial, the public land sales is far from the only intra-party fight facing the legislation. Members are also feuding over provisions related to the extent of cuts to Medicaid and climate friendly tax credits, as well as federal tax deductions for people who live in areas with high state and local taxes. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Fox News
27-06-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
House Republican opposing proposed sale of public lands says he's still against Senate bill: 'I remain a no'
Rep. Ryan Zinke, R-Mont., said in a Thursday post on X that he remains opposed to the Senate reconciliation measure. "I agree with my colleagues that the federal government has mismanaged federal lands for decades. But I don't agree with their solution. The solution is not to sell public lands. The solution is better management. Let's send legislation to POTUS desk to improve management and access. I remain a no on the senate reconciliation bill," the lawmaker noted. The president has been urging lawmakers to pass the measure. GOP Sen. Mike Lee of Utah has been pushing for the measure to include the sale of some federal land, while Zinke has been opposing the prospect. A Monday press release from the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee indicated that the public land sales provision of the measure had been flagged by the Senate parliamentarian. "Housing prices are crushing families and keeping young Americans from living where they grew up. We need to change that," Lee noted in a Monday night post on X. "Yes, the Byrd Rule limits what can go in the reconciliation bill, but I'm doing everything I can to support President Trump and move this forward," he noted. Zinke served as Interior secretary during a portion of President Donald Trump's first term in office.
Yahoo
26-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Zinke says he's a ‘no' on Senate megabill amid public land sales push
Montana Republican Rep. Ryan Zinke said Thursday he'll vote against the Senate's version of the GOP megabill over a provision that would mandate the sale of up to 1.2 million acres of public lands. Zinke's internal disagreements on the public land sales measure poses yet another complication in negotiations over a bill on which House Republicans can only afford to lose three votes. 'I agree with my colleagues that the federal government has mismanaged federal lands for decades. But I don't agree with their solution,' said Zinke, who was Interior Secretary during Trump's first term, in a post on the social platform X. 'The solution is not to sell public lands,' he added. 'I remain a no on the senate reconciliation bill.' In a separate interview with CNN that Zinke also posted on social media Thursday, he pushed back on land sale supporters' argument that the land can be used for affordable housing. 'Affordable housing is tens of acres, not millions of acres,' he said. He's not the only GOP lawmaker to come out against the provision. Rep. Cliff Bentz (R-Ore.) issued a statement dissing the bill on Wednesday. 'I do support and encourage sale or exchange of parcels of federal land when there is a clear economic or social demand for such disposition, and when that disposition follows appropriate procedure and is generally supported by those affected,' he said in the statement. 'I do not support a mandated disposition of millions of acres of federal land, the amount of which was arbitrarily established, the primary goal not being to respond to demand, but instead being the removal of land from federal ownership,' he added. It's not clear whether he'd also vote against the bill over the disagreements. An original proposal — from Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) — would have required the sales of between 2.2 million and 3.3 million acres of land owned by the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management (BLM). After that proposal was rejected by the Senate parliamentarian, Lee drafted a new version that would require the sale of up to 1.2 million acres of BLM land. It's not entirely clear if the parliamentarian will approve the new version. Lee has said he wants to sell the acres in order to 'expand housing, support local development and get Washington, D.C., out of the way of communities that are just trying to grow.' The intraparty discord on the matter adds further complications to already difficult internal negotiations over Medicaid cuts, federal tax deductions in areas with high local taxes and the phaseout of incentives for low-carbon energy. Meanwhile, the White House insists it would like to see a deal reached by next Friday. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
