Biden Admin Shuts Down Future Oil and Gas Activity on Thousands of Acres

The Biden administration announced Monday that it has moved to shut down future oil, gas and mining activity on thousands of acres of New Mexico land for the next 50 years.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM), a sub-agency of the Department of the Interior (DOI), issued the Monday proposal to block new oil, gas and mineral extraction activity on 4,000 acres of land in Sandoval County, New Mexico, according to a DOI press release. The proposal is motivated by the agency’s desire to safeguard tribal cultures and recreational activity in the area, and the policy would last for 50 years if finalized.

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Biden Admin Proposes New Rule to Jack Up Prices for Oil and Gas Leases

The Biden administration unveiled a new oil and gas leasing rule proposal Thursday that would jack up prices at nearly every stage of the public land leasing process.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM), a subagency of the Department of the Interior (DOI), issued the rule proposal Thursday in an effort to adopt a “more transparent, inclusive and just approach” to federal oil and gas leasing on public lands and “[provide] a fair return to taxpayers,” Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management Laura Daniel-Davis said, according to a Thursday DOI press release. The rule nominally aims to boost land conservation efforts, but it would do so by massively increasing minimum bid thresholds and required per-acre fees for energy interests and developers to pay.

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Eco Activists Sue to Stop U.S. Oil and Gas Lease Sales

Environmental groups sued the Interior Department Tuesday to challenge the first oil and gas lease sale on public lands during the Biden administration.

A coalition of environmental groups led by Dakota Resource Council filed a lawsuit in in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, alleging that the sales violate the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, which requires that the Interior Department prevent “unnecessary or undue degradation” of public lands.

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Biden Bashed for Action That Could Ban Minnesota Mining Project

President Joe Biden’s administration wants to lead an electric vehicle (EV) revolution, but apparently doesn’t want domestic production of rare earth minerals vital to EVs.

The Biden administration announced a two-year study on a proposed Twin Metals copper-nickel mine in northeast Minnesota that could delay it for 20 years and stop one of the few planned copper-nickel mines in the nation while the U.S attempts to pivot to EVs from gasoline-powered internal combustion vehicles.

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Watchdog Demands Inspector General Investigation into Tracy Stone-Manning’s Allegedly False Statements About Eco-Terrorism Case

A government watchdog group demanded that the Department of the Interior Inspector General launch an investigation into whether President Joe Biden’s Senate-confirmed Bureau of Land Management director nominee violated the False Statement Act with statements she made to Congress about her involvement in a 1989 eco-terrorism case during her confirmation process.

Tracy Stone-Manning was confirmed to lead the agency along a party-line vote on Sept. 30 amid strong opposition from Republicans who accused her of lying to the Senate Energy Committee about her involvement in an eco-terrorism case. Stone-Manning testified in federal court in 1993 that she sent an anonymous, threatening letter to the Forest Service in 1989 on behalf of her former roommate and friend which warned that a local forest in Idaho had been sabotaged with tree spikes to make the trees unsafe to log.

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Senate Confirms Alleged Eco-Terrorist Collaborator to Lead Bureau of Land Management

The Senate vote 50-45 on a party-line vote Thursday to confirm President Joe Biden’s Bureau of Land Management nominee amid strong opposition from Republicans and former Obama administration officials over the nominee’s involvement in a 1989 eco-terrorism incident.

The nominee, Tracy Stone-Manning, failed to win a single Republican vote amid accusations she lied to the Senate Energy Committee over her involvement in the 1989 Clearwater National Forest tree-spiking case. All 48 Senate Democrats and the two independent senators who caucus with the party voted in favor of Stone-Manning’s nomination to lead the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which oversees 245 million acres of public lands.

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Judge Blocks Massive Alaskan Oil Drilling Project Backed by Trump and Biden

A federal judge blocked a massive Alaskan oil drilling project Wednesday after ruling that the Interior Department inadequately measured its environmental impact.

Judge Sharon Gleason of the U.S. District Court of the District of Alaska wrote in her opinion that the Bureau of Land Management’s assessment of the ConocoPhillips’ Willow project was “arbitrary and capricious,” noting that it did not even include the likely level of greenhouse gas emissions in its environmental impact report.

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Biden Nominee Helped Edit Radical Paper That Gloated the Feds Were Bungling Investigation into Tree Spiking Plot

President Joe Biden’s nominee to lead the Bureau of Land Management was an editor for an issue of the radical Earth First journal that contained a non-bylined story gloating that federal investigators were bungling their investigation into an eco-terrorism incident the nominee was directly involved in.

The nominee, Tracy Stone-Manning, was one of the six members of the editorial collective for the June 21, 1991, edition of the radical environmental journal. One of the only stories in the 40-page issue that did not contain an author byline was a story celebrating the Forest Service’s move to deactivate their investigation into the 1989 Clearwater National Forest tree spiking incident in the absence of any solid leads.

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All 10 Republican Members of Senate Energy Committee Sign Letter Urging Biden to Withdraw BLM Nominee over ‘Eco-Terrorism’ Ties

Tracy Stone-Manning

The 10 Republican members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee signed a letter Wednesday calling on President Joe Biden to withdraw his nominee to lead the Bureau of Land Management in a letter Wednesday over her involvement in a 1989 eco-terrorism incident.

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Obama-Appointed Judge Blocks Wyoming Oil Lease Sale Over ‘Climate Change’

by Tim Pearce   A federal judge temporarily blocked new oil lease auctions in Wyoming on Tuesday after finding the Department of the Interior “did not sufficiently consider climate change” when proposing the lease sales, The Washington Post reports. Washington D.C. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras ruled the government violated…

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Report: Years of Bad Land Management Led to One of California’s Most Devastating Wildfires

by Jason Hopkins   An in-depth investigation found that federal, state and local governments were aware of California’s vulnerability to wildfires, but failed to take the necessary steps to prevent its devastation. California residents have recently been forced to deal with some of the worst wildfires in the state’s history.…

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Hundreds Of Federal Employees Will Be Moved Out Of Washington, D.C.

moving

by Tim Pearce   The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is moving two agencies and roughly 700 federal employees out of Washington, D.C., to save money and improve the department’s service to taxpayers. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue announced Thursday that the Economic Research Service (ERS) and the National Institute of Food and…

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The Department of the Interior Will Pay 1,900 Local Governments $553 Million in ‘Lost Tax Revenue’ in 2018

federal lands

by Daniel Di Martino   Over 1,900 local governments received $553 million from the Department of Interior this year to compensate them for lost tax revenue for federal lands that cannot be developed in their territory. These payments are the consequence of more than 640 million acres of land, which amounts to 28 percent of…

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DENIED: Judge In The Bundy Trial Spikes Prosecutors’ Plea For One Last Shot At A Conviction

Cliven Bundy

by Tim Pierce   A federal judge rejected prosecutors’ request Tuesday to reconsider her dismissal of the case against Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, his two sons and friend Ryan Payne. U.S. District Judge Gloria M. Navarro dismissed conspiracy charges against the four men on Jan. 8 after finding that prosecutors…

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