May 5, 2025

Re: LCV Opposes HNRC Reconciliation Pursuant to H. Con. Res. 14, Concurrent Resolution on the Budget for Fiscal Year 2025

Dear Representatives:

The League of Conservation Voters (LCV) believes that everyone has a right to clean air, clean water, public lands, and a safe climate protected by a just and equitable democracy. The reconciliation instructions for Concurrent Resolution on the Budget for Fiscal Year 2025, (H. Con. Res.14) led by the House Natural Resources Committee majority is an extreme attack on our climate and environment, putting the interests of corporate polluters above those of the people and American taxpayers. Therefore, on behalf of our millions of members and supporters, we write to express strong opposition to the committee’s reconciliation legislation.

This legislation proposes to double down on the dirty energy that exacerbates the climate crisis while skirting science and public input. Specifically, this bill:

• Strikes yet another attack on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge by mandating that four oil and gas lease sales be held in the Coastal Plain. After two failed lease sales in the last four years, which generated zero revenue for the Treasury, and proves drilling in the Arctic Refuge is not about raising revenue.
• Mandates lease sales on unprecedented amounts of public lands, including mandated quarterly lease sales in WY, NM, CO, UT, MT, ND, OK, NV, AK and any state with land available for oil and gas leasing under the Mineral Leasing Act. It sells out our public lands and waters to the highest, and sometimes lowest, bidder by reinstating noncompetitive leasing, which allows parcels not bid on to be sold for a $75 fee. Ironically, by proposing to lower the oil and gas royalty rate from 16.67% to 12.5%, this legislation would in-turn generate less revenue and cost taxpayers billions of dollars in lost revenue.
• Mandates 30 new lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico, each spanning at least 80 million acres, and 6 new lease sales in Alaska’s Cook Inlet, putting coastal communities and livelihoods at risk of more oil spills, pollution, and climate disasters.
• Takes us back to the coal age, by mandating at least 4 million new acres of coal leasing.
• Strips measures in place to protect the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness from toxic mining in its headwaters by cancelling the withdrawal of 225,000 acres in the Superior National Forest from new hardrock mining.
• Increases logging on our national forests by 25% to benefit the timber industry.
• Mandates the approval for the Amber Road Project that would have devastating impacts to the Brooks Range and the subsistence uses of Alaska Native communities.
• Rescinds billions of dollars in funding from the Inflation Reduction Act that support coastal communities and climate resilience, protection of old-growth forests, National Parks and public lands protections, and environmental and climate data collection.

Underpinning these awful provisions is perhaps the most egregious erosion of the National Environmental Protection Act that safeguards communities. This legislation proposes to allow corporate polluters to pay for expedited environmental reviews that in turn shield them from any accountability and judicial review. This bill allows some of the most harmful and polluted industries to operate in some of the most pristine landscapes, with “environmental review” in name only, at the expense of frontline communities, taxpayers, and our climate.

For these reasons and more, we urge you to oppose this bill and its egregious attacks on our public lands, clean air and water, and the laws put in place to safeguard communities.

Sincerely,

League of Conservation Voters