{"id":74358,"date":"2019-09-14T18:18:31","date_gmt":"2019-09-15T00:18:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/dems-question-trump-official-on-lands-native-americans\/"},"modified":"2019-09-15T00:18:31","modified_gmt":"2019-09-15T00:18:31","slug":"dems-question-trump-official-on-lands-native-americans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/dems-question-trump-official-on-lands-native-americans\/","title":{"rendered":"Dems question Trump official on lands, Native Americans"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Rep.
Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo., at a House Judiciary Committee hearing July 24. Neguse is among Congressional Democrats who are questioning a Trump administration official\u2019s commitment to public lands and his attitude toward Native Americans.<\/span>Associated Press file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

DENVER \u2014 Skeptical Democrats questioned a Trump administration official Tuesday on whether he\u2019s committed to preserving public lands and whether he respects Native Americans.<\/p>\n

William Perry Pendley, acting director of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, appeared before the House Natural Resources Committee in Washington to answer questions about the administration\u2019s plans to move bureau headquarters from the District of Columbia to the West, closer to the 388,000 square miles (1 million square kilometers) the agency oversees.<\/p>\n

The toughest questions were about his attitude toward public lands and Native Americans.<\/p>\n

Rep. Joe Neguse, a Colorado Democrat, asked Pendley about a 2016 article he wrote saying the nation\u2019s founders intended for the federal government to sell all its land.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have never advocated the wholesale disposal or transfer of those lands,\u201d Pendley said. \u201cI support the president and (Interior Secretary David) Bernhardt in their crystal-clear opposition to the wholesale disposal or transfer of public lands.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neguse asked if the word \u201cwholesale\u201d was a loophole that would allow the administration to sell or transfer land. Pendley replied that he was referring to Congress\u2019 authority to mandate transfers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere may be case-specific circumstances where we do transfer or dispose, but Congress is the boss,\u201d Pendley said.<\/p>\n

Rep. Deb Haaland, a New Mexico Democrat and a citizen of the Laguna Pueblo, brought up allegations that in a 2009 meeting of Republicans, Pendley mocked Native Americans for wanting to protect land they consider holy. She said Pendley reportedly used his fingers to indicate quotation marks around the word \u201choly.\u201d<\/p>\n

She asked Pendley if that was appropriate for an employee of the Bureau of Land Management, which protects culturally important areas.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was not speaking as a member of the BLM. I was speaking as a private attorney representing private clients,\u201d Pendley said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you were able to just forget what you did back then, and now that you\u2019re working for BLM, everything\u2019s OK?\u201d Haaland shot back.<\/p>\n

Pendley answered that the American people are now his clients, and \u201cI\u2019m a zealous advocate for my client.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said he was happy to now work with Native Americans, particularly on energy development.<\/p>\n

Before he joined the Bureau of Land Management, Pendley represented an oil company in a legal dispute over proposed oil and gas drilling on Montana land considered sacred by the Blackfoot tribes of the U.S. and Canada and said the tribes\u2019 concerns were driven by \u201creligious myth.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s absolutely nothing there,\u201d Pendley told an Associated Press reporter last year. \u201cThe tribe is simply saying \u2018It\u2019s part of our myth. The whole area is part of our myth.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Bernhardt named Pendley the acting head of the BLM in July. The agency oversees public land \u2014 99% of it in 12 Western states \u2014 and balances competing demands from oil and gas drilling, mining, ranching, outdoor recreation and environmental protection.<\/p>\n

Pendley is a longtime advocate for ranchers and others in disputes with the federal government over grazing and other uses of public lands. Environmental groups called his appointment alarming, but some Western ranchers were pleased, saying it was a sign the Trump administration was pushing to open public lands to all uses, including grazing and mining.<\/p>\n

One of Pendley\u2019s first duties will be overseeing the administration\u2019s plan to move the bureau\u2019s headquarters to Grand Junction, in western Colorado, and disperse about 300 Washington-based employees across the West.<\/p>\n

Most of the bureau\u2019s 10,000 employees are already in Western field offices, but Pendley repeated the administration\u2019s argument that moving most of the Washington staff to the West would lead to better, faster decisions.<\/p>\n

When Democrat Eleanor Holmes Norton, the District of Columbia\u2019s delegate to Congress, asked whether moving so many employees West would leave a leadership vacuum in Washington, Pendley replied, \u201cI\u2019ll be here,\u201d along with budget and policy officials.<\/p>\n

Interior Department spokesman Russell Newell said later that Pendley would remain in Washington in his permanent role as deputy director for policy and programs. Newell said the next permanent director would be based in Grand Junction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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