Tag: Bureau of Land Management

Biden’s public lands nominee, once linked to eco-saboteurs, advances with key Senate vote

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Republicans say Tracy Stone-Manning’s past affiliation with eco-saboteurs makes her unqualified to run the Bureau of Land Management

Tracy Stone-Manning, President Biden’s pick to be the top public lands manager, moved one step closer to becoming director of the Bureau of Land Management on Thursday as the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee advanced her nomination solely with Democratic support.

For weeks, Republicans have adamantly called on Biden to withdraw Stone-Manning’s nomination due to her decision as a University of Montana graduate student to send a letter on behalf of eco-saboteurs in 1989. The group drove metal spikes into trees in Idaho set to be cut down — an act designed to make it more dangerous for loggers to saw through the trunks.

“It is hard to imagine a nominee more disqualified than Tracy Stone-Manning,” said Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), the top Republican on the committee, at one point holding up a gray metal spike. He was among the 10 Republicans on the panel who voted against her nomination. Continue reading.

Trump pulls nomination of ‘pro-polluter’ to oversee nation’s public lands

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Environmental campaigners on Saturday welcomed news that President Donald Trump withdrew his nomination of “pro-polluter” and “unapologetic racist” William Perry Pendley for director of the Bureau of Land Management, with groups saying he should no longer be allowed to continue in his role as unofficial head of the agency.

We are hearing the Trump administration is pulling down their nomination of William Perry Pendley for BLM director. It’s about damn time.

— Martin Heinrich (@MartinHeinrich) August 15, 2020

Pendley, who’s called fracking an “environmental miracle,” was panned by civil rights, environmental, tribal, and immigrant advocacy groups as “the worst possible person you could conjure to be a leading steward of our shared public lands” given his public record that includes a history of racist and sexist comments, “overt racism” toward native people, dismissal of the climate crisis, suggestion that “the Founding Fathers intended all lands owned by the federal government to be sold,” and a 17-page list of 57 potential conflicts of interest. Continue reading.

Documents show extent of Interior plan to decentralize BLM

The Hill logoIncluded in the Department of Interior’s decision to decentralize the Washington office that manages the nation’s public lands is a plan to move congressional affairs staff 2,600 miles away to Reno, Nevada.

The agency announced in July that it would be moving about 300 D.C.-based Bureau of Land Management (BLM) employees out West, but internal Interior Department documents shared with The Hill on Monday show the extent to which roles traditionally placed in the nation’s capital are being shotgunned across the country.

The July 15 documents include a position-by-position breakdown of Interior’s unprecedented plans for BLM’s reorganization — information that has yet to be shared with employees who are still waiting to hear where they must relocate.

View the complete September 9 article by Rebecca Beitsch and Miranda Green on The Hill website here.

Trump’s pick for managing federal lands doesn’t believe the government should have any

Washington Post logoPresident Trump’s pick for managing federal lands doesn’t think the federal government should have any.

This week, Trump’s Interior Secretary David Bernhardt signed an order making the Wyoming native William Perry Pendley the acting director of the Bureau of Land Management. Pendley, former president of the Mountain States Legal Foundation, was a senior official in Ronald Reagan’s administration.

The appointment comes as a critical time for the BLM, which manages more than a tenth of the nation’s land and oversees the federal government’s oil, gas and coal leasing program. Two weeks ago, Interior officials announced the department would reassign 84 percent of the bureau’s D.C. staff out West by the end of next year. Only a few dozen employees, including Pendley, would remain in Washington.

View the complete July 31 article by Steven Mufson on The Washington Post website here.