Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) was not impressed.
The House passed the National Defense Authorization Act this week, and while much of the attention was on the
anti-immigration aspects of the legislation, Republican lawmakers also
hit the administration on the Endangered Species Act and the endangered sage grouse.
But a Republican maneuver on the $612 billion military bill to block the Interior Department from adding the bird to the endangered species list has set off a major congressional skirmish that has spilled over into Western states, where the sage grouse is revered, and among environmental groups that fear a steady erosion of the Endangered Species Act. […]
House Republicans, in advance of a legal deadline for final determination of the sage grouse status, have gone at it in several forms, most recently in the military bill. There they argued that giving the bird special status would put military training operations in peril because the birds’ habitat—which stretches across an array of Western training areas—would be essentially off limits. […]
House Democrats were not amused by these efforts. Armed with a large poster of the lesser prairie chicken wielding a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, Representative Jackie Speier, Democrat of California, accused Republicans of treating the birds as "a sort of feathery sleeper cell."
That's the excuse for adding this prohibition to the bill, but it's not reality.
Management of the bird has not "resulted in unacceptable limits on our military readiness activities," said Mark E. Wright, a Defense Department spokesman.
"Because we have already undertaken these actions voluntarily, and expect to need to manage for the sage grouse indefinitely, we do not believe the listing decision—regardless of the outcome—will affect our mission activities to any great degree," he said.
Who is really opposed to the listing, of course, is the oil and gas industry. Sage grouse habitat is also drilling and fracking ground. Groups like the Western Energy Alliance, the Independent Petroleum Association of America and the Domestic Energy Producers Alliance have been lobbying hard to prevent this listing, and they and their member organizations "are among the top donors to election campaigns of major players in Congress who have pushed legislation that would block Interior’s actions." Of course.