Republicans approved new House rules that could lead to cash-strapped cities and states selling off natural areas that were previously protected to private developers and extractive industries.
Newly-elected Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy celebrates in his office after he was elected in 15 rounds of votes in a meeting of the 118th Congress on January 7, 2023, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington D.C.Republicans approved new House rules on Monday making it easier for lawmakers to cede federal public lands to state and local governments without accounting for the costs to taxpayers.
Passing a rules package for House business was the next step toward legislation for the Republican majority after a difficult week of wrangling to elect House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. The 55-pageis the result of weeks of negotiation between McCarthy and a faction of ultra-conservatives who used the GOP’s slim majority to squeeze out a number of concessions and create a painful spectacle on the House floor last week, when McCarthy was finally elected after 15 rounds of voting.
Some of the rule changes were expected, including new rules curbing McCarthy’s power and making it easier for lawmakers to demand spending cuts and launch partisan investigations into the Biden administration. However, Democrats say new rules barring the Congressional Budget Office from calculating the value of federal public lands given away by Congress is a throwback to a previous Republican majority that pandered to anti-government extremists in mostly Western states.
Rep. Raul Grijalva of Arizona, the ranking Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee, said Republicans are making it easier to “cheat American taxpayers and give away our public lands for nothing in return.” “This is Republicans doing the bidding of anti-public lands extremists — a consistent theme we’ve seen when they were in charge before, and one I’m afraid we’ll see a lot more of in the next two years,” Grijalva said in a statement Friday.
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