June, 14 2017, 04:00pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Taylor McKinnon, Center for Biological Diversity, (801) 300-2414, tmckinnon@biologicaldiversity.org
Bob Fulkerson, Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada (PLAN), (775) 348-7557, bfulkerson@planevada.org
Kelly Fuller, Western Watersheds Project, (928) 322-8449, kfuller@westernwatersheds.org
John Hadder, Great Basin Resource Watch, (775) 348-1986, john@gbrw.org
David von Seggern, Sierra Club Toiyabe Chapter, (775) 303-8461
Trump Administration Offers 195,000 Nevada Acres for Fracking
Water, Wildlife, Public Lands, Climate in Crosshairs
WASHINGTON
Despite legal protests from conservation groups, the Bureau of Land Management is auctioning off 195,732 acres (304 square miles) of public lands in Nevada today for fossil fuel development. The BLM dismissed the protests on Tuesday, ignoring or downplaying legal and environmental concerns about fracking impacts to public lands, surface and groundwater, wildlife and the climate.
"We won't let Nevada's water and wildlife be sacrificed for oil industry profits -- if the BLM wants a fight, it's found one," said Taylor McKinnon with the Center for Biological Diversity. "Trump administration oil industry cronyism has no place on America's public lands."
The fracking auction covers public lands in northern Nevada, including the Big Smoky, Diamond and Railroad valleys and the Diamond, Fish Creek and Sulphur Creek mountain ranges. Wildlife at risk include mule deer, greater sage grouse, the threatened Railroad Valley springfish and other species that live in springs fed by aquifers threatened by fracking.
Under the Obama administration, the BLM's original preferred alternative would have deferred more than 104,000 acres from leasing because of environmental concerns. Now, under Trump, the BLM has put that land back on the table.
"It is outrageous that profits for oil and gas corporations trump protecting our precious desert groundwater," said Bob Fulkerson, state director of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada. "The BLM must cease cosigning on their plunder of Nevada."
Conservation groups' protest challenged the BLM's failure to analyze the environmental impacts of high-volume hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, especially relating to depletion and pollution of aquifers and the springs they feed. The groups argued that the Battle Mountain District resource management plan, which was written long before the widespread use of fracking on public land, must be updated prior to new leasing.
"The government's environmental analysis failed to truly address obvious dangers of leasing these public lands to oil companies," said John Hadder, director of Great Basin Resource Watch. "Oil and gas extraction is a dirty business that will release toxic chemicals into the air and water upon which communities depend. We urge federal officials to end this irresponsible leasing practice."
In its environmental analysis for the lease sale, the BLM failed to consider the impact of fracking on wildlife and habitat. In addition, its requirements for fossil fuel companies and other developers are weak, vague and unenforceable, opening the door to the destruction of riparian areas, wetlands, priority sage grouse habitat and big-game ranges.
"Fracking these valleys will drive greater sage-grouse closer to the brink of extinction. This iconic western bird is part of the heritage of every American, and future generations will not look kindly on us if we lose it before they can see it," said Kelly Fuller, energy campaign coordinator at Western Watersheds Project.
The BLM also failed to adequately consider the greenhouse gas pollution that would result from fracking, and failed to consider an alternative that would prohibit leasing to protect the climate. Studies have shown that the carbon pollution from new federal fossil fuel leasing is incompatible with U.S. commitments under the Paris climate agreement to limit global warming to 1.5 or 2 degrees Celsius.
Said David von Seggern, chair of the Toiyabe Chapter of the Sierra Club: "Oil and gas leasing in Nevada is nearly a futile exercise. With miniscule production in the past and even today, Nevada has no sizable oil and gas industry. What Nevada has is huge solar and geothermal energy resources -- we should continue to grow those industries."
The BLM's denial of the groups' protest begins a 30-day period for appeal to the Interior Board of Land Appeals.
LATEST NEWS
World's Richest Man, Other Billionaires Rally Around Trump After Assassination Attempt
Elon Musk, Bill Ackman, and David Sacks spoke out in support of the presumptive Republican nominee, who helped make billionaires $1 trillion richer during his first White House term.
Jul 15, 2024
Several prominent billionaires—including the richest man on Earth—took to social media over the weekend to endorse presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump shortly after a 20-year-old gunman attempted to assassinate the former president at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday.
One of the billionaires was Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who took to the social media platform that he owns to
declare, "I fully endorse President Trump and hope for his rapid recovery." The endorsement came days after reports that Musk donated to a pro-Trump super PAC and just ahead of the start of the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.
An analyst with the Atlantic Council
toldThe Washington Post that Musk's endorsement of Trump garnered "the most engagement of any post on X related to the attempted assassination."
Musk also
suggested that the Secret Service's failure to detect and stop the gunman before he opened fire may have been "deliberate"—a post that was viewed 87 million times.
Hours after Musk's endorsement post went live, billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman
announced his decision to formally back Trump's bid for a second term in the White House, four years after the former president attempted to overturn President Joe Biden's 2020 victory and sparked a violent assault on the U.S. Capitol.
Ackman, who has
historically supported Democrats, wrote in a lengthy X post that he had privately decided to endorse Trump "some time ago" and suggested he would offer a more thorough explanation of his decision in the near future.
"I just haven't had the time nor felt the urgency to write the post as we are still a few months from the election," Ackman wrote on Saturday, hours after a gunman later identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire with an AR-style rifle, hitting Trump's right ear and killing one rally attendee.
Another billionaire, venture capitalist David Sacks, reiterated his support for Trump over the weekend after formally endorsing the former president last month and hosting a $300,000-per-person fundraiser for the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.
Sacks, who declared following the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection that Trump had "disqualified himself from being a candidate at the national level again," called the former president a "hero" on Sunday and gushed that he has "risked everything for this country."
The trio joins
at least a dozen other billionaires backing Trump, who postures as a populist ally of the working class while supporting policies that overwhelmingly benefit the ultra-rich.
Billionaires got $1 trillion richer during Trump's first term and have seen their wealth soar by $2.2 trillion since the passage of the Trump-GOP tax cuts in 2017.
Between December 2017 and September 2023, according to a recent analysis by the progressive advocacy group Americans for Tax Fairness, Musk saw his net worth rise from $20.4 billion to nearly $270 billion—a 1,222.8% increase.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Ocasio-Cortez Says Democrats Who 'Resign Themselves to Fascism' Should Retire
"This kind of leadership is functionally useless to the American people," said the New York congresswoman.
Jul 15, 2024
New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez lashed out Sunday night against an unnamed "senior House Democrat" who said party leadership had already come to terms with the idea, following the weekend assassination attempt against Donald Trump, of the far-right former Republican president winning back the White House in November.
Responding to Axiosreporting in which the lawmaker, provided anonymity by the outlet, was quoted as saying, "We've all resigned ourselves to a second Trump presidency," Ocasio-Cortez said, "If you're a 'senior Democrat' that feels this way, you should absolutely retire and make space for true leadership that refuses to resign themselves to fascism."
"This kind of leadership is functionally useless to the American people," she added. "Retire."
Since the assassination attempt on Trump in Pennsylvania on Saturday that bloodied the former president and left one event attendee dead, many political observers and pundits have said or suggested that the violent attack likely bolsters the GOP candidate's chances in the upcoming election—especially at a time that President Joe Biden appears politically weak following a disastrous debate performance last month.
Despite grave concerns among many Democratic and progressive voters about Biden's ability to defeat Trump, Ocasio-Cortez has been outspoken in her defense of Biden in recent weeks.
"What I think the president does need to do is continue to lean in and move further toward the working class, and be more assertive in providing an affirmative vision for this country," Ocasio-Cortez told Capitol Hill reporters last week.
"If we can actually provide and chart out a future that is more leaning into the needs of working people," she said, "then I think we can chart a path to win."
Following Saturday's shooting, Ocasio-Cortez condemned political violence broadly and called the incident "horrific."
"It is absolutely unacceptable and must be denounced in the strongest terms," the congresswoman said. "My heart goes out to all the victims and I wish the former president a speedy recovery."
Keep ReadingShow Less
World 'Cannot Remain Silent in the Face of This Endless Massacre,' Says Lula
"The Israeli government continues to sabotage the peace process and the cease-fire in the Middle East," said the Brazilian president after a deadly weekend of bombings.
Jul 15, 2024
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva condemned the Israeli government on Sunday after bombings across the Gaza Strip killed more than 140 people and wounded hundreds more, adding to the gruesome death toll and worsening the enclave's humanitarian emergency as cease-fire talks continue.
Lula specifically decried Israel's Saturday attack on al-Mawasi, an overcrowded town on Gaza's southern coast to which Israeli forces previously ordered Palestinians to flee. Israel claimed to be targeting Hamas' military chief in the attack; Hamas said Sunday that the commander was not harmed in the strikes, which killed around 90 people—including children.
The New York Timesreported that one of the Israeli strikes "exploded directly in front of two vehicles clearly marked as belonging to Gaza Civil Defense, an emergency services agency, spraying them with shrapnel and apparently killing and injuring first responders."
Lula said Sunday that "the Israeli government continues to sabotage the peace process and the cease-fire [negotiations] in the Middle East" with its relentless bombing campaign in the Gaza Strip, which has been utterly decimated by Israel's assault—a military campaign fueled by billions of dollars of weaponry from the United States, Germany, and other major countries.
"It is appalling that they continue to collectively punish the Palestinian people," Brazil's president said. "There have already been tens of thousands of deaths in consecutive attacks since last year, many of them in delimited humanitarian zones that should be protected."
"We, the political leaders of the democratic world, cannot remain silent in the face of this endless massacre," he added. "The cease-fire and peace in the region need to be priorities on the international agenda. All our efforts must be focused on securing the release of the Israeli hostages and ending the attacks on the Gaza Strip."
Brazil under Lula's leadership has backed the South Africa-led genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice and been a vocal supporter of a permanent cease-fire and an end to Israel's decadeslong occupation of Palestinian territory.
"I saw toddlers who are double amputees, children paralyzed and unable to receive treatment, and others separated from their parents."
Israel's weekend onslaught in Gaza came as "Hamas and Israel appear closer to some form of a Gaza cease-fire deal than at any time since the brief truce last November," as Drop Site's Jeremy Scahill put it late last week.
"Hamas is considering an approach that would not immediately require a commitment to a permanent cease-fire and complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza as a precondition to move forward in phased negotiations," Scahill reported. "This would mark a significant concession by Hamas, which has long insisted any agreement must include defined steps that end Israel's war. Instead, Hamas officials said, they would consider entering an initial six-week phase that would include a conditional cease-fire and an exchange of Israeli civilian and female soldiers held in Gaza in return for the release of hundreds of Palestinians."
The Associated Pressreported Sunday that Hamas—which led the deadly October 7 attack on Israel—intends to keep participating in cease-fire talks in the face of incessant Israeli airstrikes, though a spokesperson for the group said there is "no doubt that the horrific massacres will impact any efforts in the negotiations."
Scott Anderson, the United Nations' deputy humanitarian coordinator, described the appalling scene he witnessed over the weekend at Nasser Hospital, the overwhelmed medical facility in southern Gaza where many wounded Palestinians were taken following Israel's Saturday attack on al-Mawasi.
"With not enough beds, hygiene equipment, sheeting, or scrubs, many patients were treated on the ground without disinfectants," said Anderson. "Ventilation systems were switched off due to a lack of electricity and fuel, and the air was filled with the smell of blood. I saw toddlers who are double amputees, children paralyzed and unable to receive treatment, and others separated from their parents. I also saw mothers and fathers who were unsure if their children were alive. Parents told me in despair that they had moved into the 'so-called humanitarian zone' in the hope that their children would be safe there."
"Impediments to humanitarian operations prevent us from supporting people anywhere near the scale necessary," Anderson continued. "Civilians must be protected at all times. We urgently need a cease-fire, the release of all remaining hostages, respite for the people of Gaza, and a meaningful opportunity for healing to begin."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular