Be not a witness against thy neighbor without cause; and deceive not with thy lips. Say not, I will do so to him as he hath done to me: I will render to the man according to his work. Proverbs 24:28-29

A Public Lands Sell-Off Is Struck From the G.O.P. Policy Bill

A Public Lands Sell-Off Is Struck From the G.O.P. Policy Bill  at george magazine

Senator Mike Lee, Republican of Utah, said he would withdraw his proposal after it faced intense intraparty opposition.

Senator Mike Lee, Republican of Utah, said late Saturday that he had dropped his contentious plan to sell millions of acres of public lands from the sweeping domestic policy package that the Senate will soon begin debating.

Mr. Lee made the nighttime announcement on social media after it became clear that the plan faced insurmountable opposition from within his own party. At least four Republican senators from Western states had said they planned to vote for an amendment to strike the proposal from the bill.

The plan had also triggered intense pushback from conservative hunters and outdoorsmen across the American West, who had warned that it threatened the lands where they hunted and fished.

“Over the past several weeks, I’ve spent a lot of time listening to members of the community, local leaders and stakeholders across the country,” Mr. Lee wrote on X on Saturday. “While there has been a tremendous amount of misinformation — and in some cases, outright lies — about my bill, many people brought forward sincere concerns.”

The provision would have required the Bureau of Land Management to sell as much as 1.225 million acres of public property in 11 Western states. Proponents had argued that the region has a severe shortage of affordable housing and that developers could build new homes on these tracts.

In his post, Mr. Lee said that, because of the strict rules governing the budgetary process that Republicans are using to pass the bill, he was “unable to secure clear, enforceable safeguards to guarantee that these lands would be sold only to American families — not to China, not to BlackRock, and not to any foreign interests.”

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.


Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.


Thank you for your patience while we verify access.

Already a subscriber? Log in.

Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

error: Content is protected !!