Senate Committee Pushes Extreme Land Sell-off in Reconciliation

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee released legislative text for a sweeping budget bill that would mandate public land sales and open vast swaths of public lands and oceans to fossil fuel and industrial development.

Following is a statement from Bobby McEnaney, director of Land Conservation at NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council):

“This is a fire sale of America’s public lands and waters. The Senate’s proposal includes the worst parts of the House bill, with expanded drilling, logging, and mining, but goes even further by mandating the sell-off of more than three million acres of public lands, an area larger than Connecticut, while opening new oil leasing in America’s Arctic and locking in mandatory offshore drilling in the Gulf and Alaska.  

“This bill would lead to a wave of irreversible extraction that will rob future generations of public access to lands and waters that belong to all of us—just to bankroll tax cuts for the superrich. As currently proposed, Americans will soon lose permanent access to the public lands close to home, their favorite trails, their parks, and their favorite recreation areas. Once these lands are sold, and the no-trespassing signs go up, there will be no going back.

“Congress should reject this bill and stop treating America’s public lands and oceans like a clearance sale.”

NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) is an international nonprofit environmental organization with more than 3 million members and online activists. Established in 1970, NRDC uses science, policy, law and people power to confront the climate crisis, protect public health and safeguard nature. NRDC has offices in New York City, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Beijing and Delhi (an office of NRDC India Pvt. Ltd).