HEARING TURNS INTO PROXY FIGHT OVER FOSSIL FUELS
Interior nominee faces questions on use of public lands
The Senate confirmation hearing for Rep. Deb Haaland, D-N.M., to run the Department of the Interior morphed Tuesday into a proxy fight over the future of fossil fuels as lawmakers from oil- and gas-producing states grilled her regarding the Biden administration’s plan to transition the country toward green energy.
Nearly all the Republican members of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee questioned Haaland about her past statements regarding the need to stop drilling on federal lands managed by the Interior Department.
President Joe Biden, who says the country needs to transition away from burning fossil fuels in an effort to mitigate climate change, has paused new drilling leases on public lands and waters — a sharp departure from the Trump administration, which sought to expand drilling.
Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming, the top Republican on the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, asked in rapid succession if the federal government should permit new gas wells and coal leases in states that rely heavily on them.
“We shouldn’t undermine America’s energy production and we should not hurt our own economy,” he said. “Yet that’s precisely what the Biden administration is doing by signing an executive order to ban all new oil, coal, gas leases on federal lands, the president is taking a sledgehammer to Western states’ economies.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, flagged the executive order Biden signed on his first day in office that placed a temporary moratorium on oil and gas leasing in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR).
“You’ve got to understand, (Alaskans are) looking at this and saying, ‘Wait a minute, why is this administration out to get us?’ ” Murkowski told Haaland. “I don’t think they’re out to get us, but I do think that there is a definite threat to the resource industry that our state is blessed to be able to host.”
And Sen. Cindy HydeSmith, R-Miss., said Haaland’s views “are frankly alarming” to her constituents, and asked what she would say to people who could lose jobs if oil production in the Gulf of Mexico was limited.
Through it all, Haaland — who would also become the first Native American Cabinet secretary if confirmed — remained calm, stressed that she wanted to work with supporters and opponents alike, and kept her answers short.
And she repeatedly stressed that any changes to fossil fuel production would be Biden’s decision, saying her role if confirmed would be to execute his policy.
“I couldn’t agree more that collaboration is important,” Haaland said during the hearing, which is scheduled to continue today. “I was the highest-rated freshman in Congress on bipartisan collaboration. We can have different views. We can think differently. I feel like the people of New Mexico sent me to Congress to get work done and that’s exactly what I’ve done.”
On the question of oil and gas leases, Haaland said Biden paused new leases to review them and that it did not amount to a ban. At any rate, she added, leasing permits currently under review are going forward.
Haaland also emphasized that although she and the president support solar, wind and other clean energy to decrease the greenhouse gas emissions that are heating the planet, the transition to renewables would be slowly phased in as fossil fuels continue to dominate the American energy agenda.
Interior oversees nearly 500 million acres of surface land and almost 700 million acres of resources that lay beneath it. On top of that, it manages 2.5 billion acres on the outer continental shelf, about 50 million acres of Native American land held in trusts, more than 400 national parks, 500 wildlife refuges and a water supply for 31 million people.
The value of that and more generates $12 billion for the Treasury, $315 billion to the U.S. economy and nearly 2 million jobs, said Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., the committee chairman.