March 15, 2019
Chair Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.) today released the following statement on the Trump administration's newly announced revision to sage grouse habitat policy.
"As part of its ongoing campaign to hand over public lands to fossil fuel companies, this administration is rolling back sage grouse protections that many stakeholders created together through a long and deliberative process. It seems clear that Acting Secretary David Bernhardt's clients stand to gain more than anyone else from this… Continue Reading
March 14, 2019
This morning's Subcommittee for Indigenous Peoples of the United States hearing to examine the silent crisis of Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women (MMIW) featured four Native American women as expert witnesses who testified that Congress and federal agencies have not honored their trust responsibilities to Native communities, and that stopping the epidemic of violence against Native women will take time and resources that are not currently being offered.
The video archive of the hearing is a… Continue Reading
March 14, 2019
Chair Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.) today questioned House Republicans' recent series of embarrassing gaffes and confusing statements on how to address climate change, saying that time is short for Republicans to engage meaningfully on climate solutions. At a press conference this morning Ranking Member Rob Bishop (R-Utah) said the Green New Deal resolution - which so far has no legislation attached to it - is "tantamount to genocide for rural people," echoing extremist talking points used o… Continue Reading
March 07, 2019
Rep. Raúl Grijalva's bill enacting a permanent ban on uranium mining drew praise this week from Havasupai leaders and criticism from the mining industry, as well as from a Republican member of Arizona's congressional delegation.
"Havasupai means people of the blue green water, and we have been living here for over thousands of years," Havasupai Tribal Council Member Claudius Putesoy said.
Hundreds of Havasupai live at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. They want to protect the future of th… Continue Reading
March 07, 2019
A hearing on the threat seismic testing poses to North Atlantic right whales was plodding along Thursday when, seemingly out of nowhere, Rep. Joe Cunningham (D-S.C.) pulled out an air horn and politely asked if he could blast it.
Before that moment at a Natural Resources subcommittee hearing, Cunningham had listened to a Trump administration official testify, over and over, that firing commercial air guns under water every 10 seconds in search of oil and gas deposits over a period of months wou… Continue Reading
March 06, 2019
House Natural Resources Committee Democrats repeated their demand on Wednesday that the Interior Department furnish years of unredacted drilling permits showing how many waivers from safety rules it had given to offshore oil and gas rig operators.
Interior issued nearly 1,700 waivers from parts of the Well Control Rule between its enactment in 2016 and last spring, as POLITICO first reported last week. Critics have questioned why Interior's Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement have gr… Continue Reading
January 18, 2019
OPINION - The Trump administration tried to sneak two alarming climate change reports past the public last year just after Thanksgiving, apparently hoping everyone would be shopping or sleeping off a turkey hangover. The attempt backfired spectacularly.
One of the reports, the National Climate Assessment, gave a new sense of urgency to climate policy in a way unmatched by other recent scientific analyses. Its projections of huge impacts on people's health, their homes, and the overall U.S. econ… Continue Reading
July 18, 2018
Anti-government extremists disguising themselves as populists have already latched on to President Donald Trump's July 10 pardon of Dwight and Steven Hammond, a father-and-son ranching duo who set fire to federal lands, to argue that attacking public property is now legal activism. The public should not be fooled by this argument or misunderstand where it leads, and Congress needs to exercise its oversight authority to clarify that the Trump administration hasn't written a blank check to a dangerous ideology.… Continue Reading
July 03, 2018
Opinion: Uranium would enjoy looser environmental and permitting standards because of its importance to 'national security and economic prosperity,' U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva says.
On May 18, the Department of the Interior released a list of 35 minerals set to enjoy looser environmental and permitting standards because of their importance to "national security and economic prosperity." The list includes uranium even though DOI's screening tool suggested it didn't meet the criteria.
The Grand Can… Continue Reading
May 14, 2018
Last week Ranking Member Grijalva and Rep Lowenthal, the top Democrat on the Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee, introduced the Hardrock Leasing and Reclamation Act of 2018.
The Grijalva-Lowenthal bill requires hardrock mining operations to meet some of the same requirements and standards that already apply to oil, gas, and coal development on public lands. Among other measures, the bill would:
Eliminate the antiquated use of mining claims, and create a leasing system for hardrock mi… Continue Reading
May 08, 2018
Today marks the 230th day since our fellow Americans living in Puerto Rico lost power and were devastated by Hurricane Maria. Many people living on the island are still lacking power and still need assistance from the federal government. Instead of addressing the immediate needs of the people, Chairman Rob Bishop (R-Utah) traveled to Puerto Rico to promote oil and gas projects and discuss importing fossil fuels to the island. Bishop has continuously ignored the fact that renewable energy sources… Continue Reading
April 24, 2018
The House is voting on H.R. 3144 on Wednesday - also known as the Columbia River Salmon Extinction Act - which will drive the Pacific Northwest's salmon runs closer to extinction. Federal agencies have been ordered by the courts to develop a new salmon recovery plan to bring back dwindling salmon populations. H.R. 3144 attempts to mandate an outdated recovery plan that won't recover salmon and that has been deemed illegal by federal courts. Ranking Member Grijalva opposes the bill for the follow… Continue Reading
March 13, 2019
March 13, 2019
March 11, 2019
October 31, 2018
June 19, 2018
A June 19, 2018, report by the Government Accountability Office on the oil and gas industry frequently leasing public land and doing nothing with it.… Continue Reading
June 05, 2018
A June 5, 2018, GAO report on the high cost to taxpayers of orphaned oil and gas wells. The report finds that the Bureau of Land Management has not kept accurate records of such costs.… Continue Reading
May 22, 2018
October 03, 2017
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July 19, 2018
March 15, 2018
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March 15, 2018
