[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 75 (Wednesday, May 1, 2024)]
[House]
[Pages H2804-H2814]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1500
                 ALASKA'S RIGHT TO PRODUCE ACT OF 2023

  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 1173, I call 
up the bill (H.R. 6285) to ratify and approve all authorizations, 
permits, verifications, extensions, biological opinions, incidental 
take statements, and any other approvals or orders issued pursuant to 
Federal law necessary for the establishment and administration of the 
Coastal Plain oil and gas leasing program, and for other purposes, and 
ask for its immediate consideration in the House.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Self). Pursuant to House Resolution 
1173, the amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the 
Committee on Natural Resources, printed in the bill, modified by the 
amendment printed in part A of House Report 118-477 shall be considered 
as adopted and the bill, as amended, is considered read.
  The text of the bill is as follows:

                               H.R. 6285

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Alaska's Right to Produce 
     Act of 2023''.

     SEC. 2. CONGRESSIONAL FINDINGS.

       Congress finds that--
       (1) Congress provided clear authorization and direction 
     that the Secretary of the Interior ``shall establish and 
     administer a competitive oil and gas program for the leasing, 
     development, production, and transportation of oil and gas in 
     and from the Coastal Plain'' in section 20001 of Public Law 
     115-97 (16 U.S.C. 3143 note) (commonly known as the Tax Cuts 
     and Jobs Act);
       (2) the timely administration of the Coastal Plain Oil and 
     Gas Leasing Program is required and in the national and 
     public interest;
       (3) the Department of the Interior's cancelling of the 
     leases for the covered Coastal Plain lease tracts represents 
     a major decision of economic and political significance that 
     Congress did not delegate to the Secretary;
       (4) the Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act of 1976 (42 
     U.S.C. 6501 et seq.) requires that the Bureau of Land 
     Management--
       (A) allow for the exploration, development, and production 
     of petroleum products in the National Petroleum Reserve in 
     Alaska; and
       (B) balance, to the extent consistent with that Act, the 
     protection of ecological and cultural values in the National 
     Petroleum Reserve in Alaska; and
       (5) the proposed rule of the Bureau of Land Management 
     entitled ``Management and Protection of the National 
     Petroleum Reserve in Alaska'' (88 Fed. Reg. 62025 (September 
     8, 2023)) fails to reflect the intent of Congress for the 
     Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act of 1976 (42 U.S.C. 
     6501 et seq.).

     SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.

       In this Act:
       (1) Coastal plain.--The term ``Coastal Plain'' has the 
     meaning given the term in section 20001(a) of Public Law 115-
     97 (16 U.S.C. 3143 note).
       (2) Coastal plain oil and gas leasing program.--The term 
     ``Coastal Plain oil and gas leasing program'' means the 
     program established under section 20001(b)(2)(A) of Public 
     Law 115-97 (16 U.S.C. 3143 note).
       (3) Covered coastal plain lease tract.--The term ``covered 
     Coastal Plain lease tract'' means any of tracts 16, 17, 24, 
     26, 27, and 30 as listed in exhibit B of the document 
     published by the Bureau of Land Management entitled 
     ``Amendment to the Detailed Statement of Sale'' and dated 
     December 18, 2020 (relating to oil and gas leasing within the 
     Coastal Plain Alaska).

[[Page H2805]]

       (4) Record of decision.--The term ``Record of Decision'' 
     means the record of decision described in the notice of 
     availability of the Bureau of Land Management entitled 
     ``Notice of Availability of the Record of Decision for the 
     Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Coastal Plain 
     Oil and Gas Leasing Program, Alaska'' (85 Fed. Reg. 51754 
     (August 21, 2020)).
       (5) Secretary.--The term ``Secretary'' means the Secretary 
     of the Interior.

     SEC. 4. CONGRESSIONAL APPROVAL OF ORDERS.

       (a) Moratorium on Oil and Gas Leasing.--Any order or action 
     by the President or the Secretary that has the effect of 
     placing a moratorium on or otherwise suspending or pausing 
     oil and gas leasing in the Coastal Plain shall have no force 
     or effect.
       (b) Approval and Ratification of Existing Documentation and 
     Authorizations.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law, 
     Congress--
       (1) ratifies and approves all authorizations, permits, 
     verifications, extensions, biological opinions, incidental 
     take statements, and any other approvals or orders issued 
     pursuant to Federal law, as described in the Record of 
     Decision, necessary for the establishment and administration 
     of the Coastal Plain Oil and Gas Leasing Program; and
       (2) directs the Secretary, the Administrator of the 
     Environmental Protection Agency, and the heads of other as 
     applicable Federal departments and agencies to process, 
     reinstate, or continue to maintain such authorizations, 
     permits, verifications, extensions, biological opinions, 
     incidental take statements, and any other approvals or orders 
     described in paragraph (1).
       (c) Applicability of Other Law.--Notwithstanding any other 
     provision of law, the authorizations, permits, verifications, 
     extensions, biological opinions, incidental take statements, 
     and any other approvals or orders described in subsection 
     (b)(1) shall be considered to satisfy the requirements of--
       (1) section 1002 of the Alaska National Interest Lands 
     Conservation Act (16 U.S.C. 3142);
       (2) section 102(2)(c) of the National Environmental Policy 
     Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4332(2)(c));
       (3) section 20001 of Public Law 115-97 (16 U.S.C. 3143 
     note);
       (4) the Endangered Species Act of 1973 (16 U.S.C. 1531 et 
     seq.); and
       (5) subchapter II of chapter 5 of title 5, United States 
     Code, and chapter 7 of title 5, United States Code.

     SEC. 5. COASTAL PLAIN OIL AND GAS LEASING PROGRAM.

       (a) Reissuance of Canceled Leases.--
       (1) Acceptance of bids.--Not later than 30 days after the 
     date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary shall, without 
     modification or delay--
       (A) accept the highest valid bid for each covered Coastal 
     Plain lease tract for which a valid bid was received on 
     January 6, 2021, pursuant to the requirement to hold the 
     first lease sale in the Coastal Plain oil and gas leasing 
     program; and
       (B) provide the appropriate lease form to each winning 
     bidder under subparagraph (A) to execute and return to the 
     Secretary.
       (2) Lease issuance.--On receipt of an executed lease form 
     under paragraph (1)(B) and payment in accordance with that 
     lease of the rental for the first year, the balance of the 
     bonus bid (unless deferred), and any required bond or 
     security from the high bidder, the Secretary shall promptly 
     issue to the high bidder a fully executed lease, in 
     accordance with--
       (A) the applicable regulations, as in effect on January 6, 
     2021; and
       (B) the terms and conditions of the Record of Decision.
       (b) Requirement for Future Leases.--
       (1) Second lease sale.--Not later than December 22, 2024, 
     the Secretary shall conduct the second lease sale required by 
     section 20001(c)(1)(B)(ii)(II) of Public Law 115-97 (16 
     U.S.C. 3143 note) in accordance with the Record of Decision.
       (2) Exceptions for canceling a lease.--Notwithstanding any 
     other provision of law, the President and the Secretary may 
     not cancel a lease issued under the Coastal Plain oil and gas 
     leasing program if the Secretary has previously opened bids 
     for such a lease or disclosed the high bidder for any tract 
     that was included in a lease sale under the Coastal Plain oil 
     and gas leasing program unless the lessee is in violation of 
     the terms of the lease and fails to cure the violation after 
     a reasonable period of time.
       (c) Applicability of Prior Record of Decision.--
     Notwithstanding any other provision of law and with respect 
     to reissuing leases under subsection (a), the Record of 
     Decision shall be considered to satisfy the requirements of--
       (1) section 1002 of the Alaska National Interest Lands 
     Conservation Act (16 U.S.C. 3142);
       (2) section 102(2)(c) of the National Environmental Policy 
     Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4332(2)(c));
       (3) section 20001 of Public Law 115-97 (16 U.S.C. 3143 
     note);
       (4) the Endangered Species Act of 1973 (Public Law 93-205; 
     16 U.S.C. 1533); and
       (5) subchapter II of chapter 5 of title 5, United States 
     Code, and chapter 7 of title 5, United States Code.
       (d) Withdrawal of Supplemental Environmental Impact 
     Statement.--The Director of the Bureau of Land Management--
       (1) shall withdraw the notice of availability entitled 
     ``Notice of Availability of the Draft Coastal Plain Oil and 
     Gas Leasing Program Supplemental Environmental Impact 
     Statement'' (88 Fed. Reg. 62104 (September 8, 2023)); and
       (2) may not take any action to finalize, implement, or 
     enforce the supplemental environmental impact statement 
     described in paragraph (1).
       (e) Judicial Review.--
       (1) Judicial preclusion.--Notwithstanding any other 
     provision of law and except as provided in paragraph (2), no 
     court shall have jurisdiction to review any action taken by 
     the Secretary, the Administrator of the Environmental 
     Protection Agency, a State administrative agency, an Indian 
     Tribe, or any other Federal agency acting pursuant to Federal 
     law that grants an authorization, permit, verification, 
     biological opinion, incidental take statement, or other 
     approval described in section 4(b) for the Coastal Plain Oil 
     and Gas Leasing Program, whether issued prior to, on, or 
     after the date of enactment of this Act, and including any 
     lawsuit or any other action pending in a court as of the date 
     of enactment of this Act.
       (2) Forum exclusivity.--The United States Court of Appeals 
     for the District of Columbia Circuit shall have original and 
     exclusive jurisdiction over any claim regarding--
       (A) the validity of this section; or
       (B) the scope of authority conferred by this section.
       (3) Right to petition.--
       (A) In general.--Notwithstanding paragraph (1), a lease 
     holder may obtain a review of an alleged failure by an agency 
     to act in accordance with section 20001 of Public Law 115-97 
     (16 U.S.C. 3143 note) or with any law pertaining to the grant 
     of an authorization, permit, verification, biological 
     opinion, incidental take statement, or other approval related 
     to the lease holder's lease by filing a written petition with 
     a court of competent jurisdiction seeking an order under 
     subparagraph (B).
       (B) Deadlines.--If a court of competent jurisdiction finds 
     that an agency has failed to act in accordance with section 
     20001 of Public Law 115-97 (16 U.S.C. 3143 note) or with any 
     law pertaining to the grant of an authorization, permit, 
     verification, biological opinion, incidental take statement, 
     or other approval related to the lease holder's lease, the 
     court shall set a schedule and deadline for the agency to act 
     as soon as practicable, which shall not exceed 90 days from 
     the date on which the order of the court is issued, unless 
     the court determines a longer time period is necessary to 
     comply with applicable law.

     SEC. 6. NULLIFICATION OF CERTAIN FEDERAL AGENCY ACTIONS.

       (a) NPRA Rule.--The final rule based on the proposed rule 
     of the Bureau of Land Management entitled ``Management and 
     Protection of the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska'' (88 
     Fed. Reg. 62025 (September 8, 2023)) shall have no force or 
     effect.
       (b) Executive Order 13990.--
       (1) In general.--Section 4 of Executive Order 13990 (86 
     Fed. Reg. 7037; relating to protecting public health and the 
     environment and restoring science to tackle the climate 
     crisis) shall have no force or effect.
       (2) Funding.--No Federal funds may be obligated or expended 
     to carry out section 4 of the Executive Order described in 
     paragraph (1).
       (c) Secretarial Order 3401.--
       (1) In general.--Secretarial Order 3401 (relating to the 
     Comprehensive Analysis and Temporary Halt on all Activities 
     in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge Relating to the 
     Coastal Plain Oil and Gas Leasing Program), issued by the 
     Secretary on June 1, 2021, shall have no force or effect.
       (2) Funding.--No Federal funds may be obligated or expended 
     to carry out the Secretarial Order described in paragraph 
     (1).

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The bill shall be debatable for 1 hour, 
equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member 
of the Committee on Natural Resources, or their respective designees.
  After 1 hour of debate, it shall be in order to consider the further 
amendment printed in part B of House Report 118-477, if offered by the 
Member designated in the report, which shall be considered read, shall 
be separately debatable for the time specified in the report equally 
divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent, and shall not 
be subject to a demand for division of the question.
  The gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman) and the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Huffman) each will control 30 minutes.
  The chair recognizes the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman).


                             General Leave

  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks 
and include extraneous material on H.R. 6285.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Arkansas?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 6285, Alaska's Right to 
Produce Act.
  H.R. 6285, introduced by Congressman Stauber, would block the Biden 
administration's attacks on Alaska, its North Slope communities, and 
their elected indigenous leaders.
  Last September, the Biden administration announced two decisions that 
would disenfranchise Alaskan and North Slope communities.
  First, the administration announced it was rescinding energy leases 
in the 1002 Area of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR.

[[Page H2806]]

  When it passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, Congress approved and 
mandated the Department of the Interior for commercial leasing, 
exploration, development, and production in the 1002 Area. Production 
in the 1002 Area would be limited to roughly 2,000 acres out of the 19-
million-acre refuge. This is just a tiny postage stamp when looking at 
the big picture.
  Specifically, the law required the Department to conduct two lease 
sales in ANWR, the first by December 2021 and the second by December 
2024. The Trump administration held the first lease sale, but the Biden 
administration immediately halted it and canceled the leases without 
warning last September.
  Again, this was a law passed by Congress. Congress mandated lease 
sales in the 1002 Area with the goal of improving energy security and 
generating revenue for our country, the State of Alaska, and local 
communities on the North Slope. The funds these energy projects 
generate are necessary to support public projects and basic amenities, 
like roads and modern water and sewer systems, which have only recently 
arrived on the North Slope within the last 40 years. These amenities 
are ubiquitous to the lower 48, but the infrastructure is still being 
developed up in the North Slope.
  In a hearing on these issues in September, Nagruk Harcharek, 
president of The Voice of the Arctic Inupiat, testified on the 
importance of energy production to quality of life for Alaskans living 
on the North Slope: ``We can quantify the powerful impact of these 
projects by observing the increase of life expectancy on the North 
Slope. In 1969, before our people had any land rights and no economic 
prospects as a result, life expectancy was just 34 years. By 1980, our 
average life expectancy was 65, roughly equivalent with Libya and lower 
than North Korea. Today, our people can expect to live to an average of 
77 years. This increase, the most dramatic in the United States, can be 
directly connected to the proliferation of a basic economy, modern 
infrastructure, and services supported by resource development 
projects.''
  While the administration canceled the ANWR leases, it also issued a 
proposed rulemaking for the management of the National Petroleum 
Reserve in Alaska, or NPR-A. This rulemaking, the final version of 
which was announced 2 weeks ago, would lock up 13 million acres out of 
the 23 million acres that comprise the petroleum reserve and make it 
more challenging to conduct exploration and production activities in 
the rest of the petroleum reserve.
  To make matters worse, meaningful engagement with local governments, 
Alaska Native corporations, federally recognized Tribes, and Tribal 
nonprofits across the North Slope of Alaska was severely lacking 
throughout the rulemaking process. It was utterly nonexistent before 
the rule was proposed. Additionally, an affront to the communities on 
the North Slope, the rule was proposed during the whaling season and 
overlapped with the ANWR comment period.
  When pressed to provide more time to comment during a virtual 
meeting, Department officials explained that they couldn't extend the 
comment period further because of the Congressional Review Act.
  These actions and the utter lack of meaningful engagement and input 
were panned by the entire Alaska delegation, along with every elected 
official, local governments, Alaska Native corporations, federally 
recognized Tribes, and Tribal nonprofits across the North Slope of 
Alaska.
  Again, I thank Congressman Stauber for his work on this bill to 
repeal these disastrous actions by the Biden administration and for 
listening to the voices of Alaskans.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues to join me in support of 
H.R. 6285, and I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, once again, instead of dealing with the real problems 
facing Americans every day, we are back on the House floor talking 
about the GOP agenda--guns, oil, and polluters. It is a relentless 
mission to wreak havoc on our planet and communities, but before we go 
into the merits of this bill, here is a dose of reality.
  Last year, as our Republican friends turned a blind eye, the global 
climate surpassed 2 degrees Celsius, a threshold that ought to be taken 
quite seriously. For the first time in recorded history, we passed this 
threshold, and that made it the hottest year on record.
  Experts have determined that a 2-degree rise in global temperatures 
will inarguably cause dangerous and cascading effects on humans and our 
planet. That hasn't stopped my colleagues across the aisle. It is as if 
the majority is playing a dangerous game of chicken with our 
environment, betting against Mother Nature.
  In the disaster department, 2023 was a showcase of calamity. We 
tallied up a staggering $63 billion in weather-related catastrophes. 
This includes 19 severe storms, 2 tropical cyclones, 4 floods, a winter 
weather event, a drought, and a wildfire event. It is as if Republicans 
were sitting on the front row with the popcorn in their hands, leaning 
over to ask their oil and gas buddies what they needed in addition to 
all the other giveaways they have received from the Republican 
majority.
  There is actually even more. In a display of unparalleled negligence, 
2023 also came with 10 oil tanker spills because apparently the GOP 
agenda is also: Spill, baby, spill, and let the taxpayer foot the bill.
  We are not even talking yet about pipeline leaks. Every day in 
America, some aspect of this spiderweb of fossil fuel infrastructure is 
exploding, bursting, leaking, spilling. Last fall, there were almost 
1.1 million gallons of crude oil released into the Gulf of Mexico, yet 
my friends across the aisle don't ever legislate about that or do 
oversight about that. Republican Members don't talk about it or 
acknowledge it. One has to wonder if my colleagues on the other side of 
the aisle even care about it.
  Here we are again with an effort to expand our Nation's carbon 
footprint and expose our coastal communities to future disasters and 
oil spills. Not only does this bill grant access to one of our most 
ecologically sensitive and difficult regions to productively drill, but 
it reverses significant strides by the Biden administration to protect 
lands that Tribal nations have occupied and held sacred since time 
immemorial.
  The Arctic refuge is one of the last truly wild places left in 
America, and the urgency to preserve the Arctic refuge transcends 
environmental concerns. It is a rallying cry against irreversible 
devastation and destruction, things that would fundamentally change and 
ruin this unique, fragile, and wild place.
  The coastal plain, which is the heart of the Porcupine caribou herd's 
calving grounds, hosts nearly 200 migratory bird species annually. 
Equally vital, the 9,000-strong Gwich'in Nation, whose subsistence and 
culture depend on the caribou herd, resides along the migratory route. 
This means that development in this area would disrupt not only 
biodiversity, but it would be an assault on their indigenous 
livelihoods and traditions.
  We have already seen how that plays out. In Nuiqsut, the Alaska 
Native village nearest to the Willow oil and gas project, 70 percent of 
households rely on subsistence resources for more than half of their 
diet. With the new Willow development, hunters are being forced to 
travel farther and farther to find resources and avoid hunting grounds 
that are now dominated by the fossil fuel industry. Rolling back NPR-A 
protections would make matters even worse.
  In the Bering Sea, which is home to many unique marine ecosystems and 
rich in indigenous cultures, sea ice is melting earlier and freezing 
later. This threatens access to subsistence hunting and fishing 
grounds. Any increased vessel traffic related to oil and gas 
development would further stress and create risk for an already 
vulnerable ecosystem.
  Exploiting these sensitive areas is equivalent to sacrificing those 
on the front lines of the climate crisis as martyrs in order to 
temporarily quench the insatiable thirst of Big Oil for money.
  Let's get one more thing clear. The drilling that would be green-
lighted in this bill would not make us energy independent. The United 
States is already the number one producer of oil and gas in the world. 
We are exporting record amounts of fossil fuel, but consumers still get 
hit with price shocks

[[Page H2807]]

anytime OPEC decides to raise prices or Russia starts a war in Europe 
because oil and gas are global commodities.
  Fossil fuel dependence is not true energy independence because you 
are always on the roller coaster. You are always subject to the whims 
of some cartel, somebody gaming the global commodity market, some 
explosion, some international event.
  If we want energy independence, we need a transition to clean energy, 
which is cheaper, safer, and generated entirely here at home, instead 
of being at the mercy of global price shocks like oil and gas.
  The Republican agenda is predictable, repetitive, and dangerous. They 
need to stop putting polluters over people.
  Enough is enough. We can no longer exploit our frontline communities 
and delicate ecosystems to pad the pockets of the fossil fuel 
industries and its GOP cronies.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this bill, and I reserve 
the balance of my time.

                              {time}  1515

  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Minnesota (Mr. Stauber), the lead sponsor of this bill.
  Mr. STAUBER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 6285, 
Alaska's Right to Produce Act.
  From Minnesota to Alaska, President Biden has repeatedly prevented 
the responsible production of America's abundant natural resources.
  In Minnesota's Eighth District, which I am proud to represent, the 
Biden administration banned mining, locking up the world's largest 
untapped copper-nickel mine in the world.
  Now he has turned his focus to the great State of Alaska, where he 
has made multiple moves to block energy development on Alaska's North 
Slope.
  Last fall, the Biden administration first announced their plans to 
cancel the remaining oil and gas lease sales in the Arctic National 
Wildlife Refuge and limit energy development within the National 
Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. I will repeat that, National Petroleum 
Reserve-Alaska. And within the last 2 weeks, the Biden administration 
finalized this devastating blow to the Alaska communities.
  To quote from the testimony of Charles Lampe, the president of 
Kaktovik Inupiat Corporation in response to these actions, ``We are a 
small community that suffers as the Federal winds blow and feel the 
Biden administration is working to effectively erase us from the land 
that we have inhabited for hundreds of years.''
  These actions have only further reinforced my view that Biden's 
energy and mining policy can be summed up as ``anywhere but America, 
any worker but American.''
  In fact, Mr. Speaker, the Biden administration has levied more 
sanctions against the great State of Alaska than they have Iran. The 
Biden administration has put 63 sanctions against energy production in 
Alaska, more than Iran. In fact, they are taking off sanctions from 
Iran. This administration has taken off sanctions from Iran.
  They are punishing the great State of Alaska. It is uncalled for. Not 
only does this decision run counter to the wishes of Alaska's Tribes 
and other hardworking Alaskans who stood to benefit from the jobs, 
opportunities, and revenue that the responsible production of these 
resources would create, but it will further cement our reliance on 
Iran, Russia, China, and Venezuela for the energy and natural resources 
on which we all rely.
  Mr. Speaker, how does that make any sense?
  As our adversaries become more and more hostile, shouldn't the 
President be doing everything in his power to make American energy 
independent once again?
  Energy security is national security.
  At a time when American families are struggling under the weight of 
record-high inflation and energy prices due to Biden policies, 
shouldn't the President be doing everything he can to support domestic 
energy projects that will create jobs and lower costs?
  As the chairman of the Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee, I 
am proud to introduce the Alaska's Right to Produce Act to allow 
Alaskans to develop their God-given natural resources. I introduced 
this commonsense legislation with Alaska's Representative Mary Peltola, 
a Democrat, and Alaska's two Senators, and I thank them for their 
leadership on this critical issue.
  The Alaskans on the North Slope support this legislation, Mr. 
Speaker. They support it because the oil and gas revenues allow them to 
build schools and hospitals, pay for their police, pay for their fire 
service, have libraries, have the fundamental parts of our communities 
that we all have and all deserve.
  The only way they can sustain that, Mr. Speaker, is allowing things 
like this to go forward. Alaskans should be proud to ethically and 
responsibly resource this. Again, there were 63 sanctions against the 
great State. You have got to be kidding me. As my co-chair of the 
Tennis Caucus would agree, John McEnroe, ``You have got to be kidding 
me.'' It is unbelievable. The great people of Alaska deserve better 
than what this administration is forcing upon them.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I do appreciate my colleague's love of 
tennis, our mutual love of tennis and his sense of humor. I have less 
appreciation when he draws tortured analogies to international 
sanctions and national security issues. It is just hard to take that 
kind of sanctimony seriously from somebody who just last week voted, 
along with the majority of the House Republican Conference, to hand 
Ukraine over to Vladimir Putin.
  As I often say in these debates, you have to take a lot of this 
political theater with a grain of salt, in this case, with a glass of 
vodka.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 6 minutes to the gentlewoman from Alaska (Mrs. 
Peltola).
  Mrs. PELTOLA. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, the honorable Mr. 
Stauber, for his work on this measure.
  I rise today to speak about Alaska's Right to Produce Act and how I 
will be voting.
  This bill unintentionally pits two of Alaska's most important 
industries, energy and fisheries, against one another. Alaska faces an 
energy crisis, which is more than slightly ironic since our State has 
vast energy resources. Alaska pays some of the highest prices in the 
country for the petroleum we need to heat our homes through winter and 
the fuel that we need to transport ourselves and our goods.
  Everyone knows Alaska is rich in oil and gas, but we also have great 
wind energy potential in the Cook Inlet, geothermal exploration in the 
Aleutians, and expanding hydropower in the southeast.
  However, many Alaskans live in extremely rural areas that rely on 
diesel and biomass to heat our homes through harsh winters. Those fuels 
are more expensive and contribute to air pollution in regions like 
Fairbanks, which has some of the worst air quality in the Nation.
  While some would love to jump straight from diesel to wind, that is 
unrealistic in Alaska. What we can do is use natural gas as a bridge 
fuel to move more people to cleaner-burning energy and reduced air 
pollution.
  That is why I believe Alaskans should be able to develop and 
transport the natural gas we have available on our North Slope for our 
use throughout the State. I genuinely support an all-of-the-above 
approach on energy.

  Alaskans can't afford to be picky about where energy comes from. My 
personal energy bills are over $1,000 a month, a reality that many of 
my lower 48 colleagues do not fully understand.
  I was the only Democrat to support this legislation at markup, and I 
still support the bill's intent. Alaska needs to develop energy for our 
use and economic well-being.
  However, this bill would nullify the Northern Bering Sea Climate 
Resilience Area. This resilience area was created at the request of 
Alaska Native Tribes in the region. It empowers the people who have 
lived there for thousands of years to exercise their self-determination 
and be equal voices on policy decisions facing the Northern Bering Sea.
  Let me be clear: This bill never intended to target the Northern 
Bering Sea Climate Resilience Area. That is why I proposed an amendment 
that would have removed this resilience area from the final bill text. 
That is

[[Page H2808]]

also why today I introduced a clean version of the Alaska's Right to 
Produce Act that doesn't impact the Northern Bering Sea Climate 
Resilience Area.
  Alaska's Right to Produce aims to ensure my State can continue to 
develop its onshore oil and gas resources in areas like the National 
Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.
  It is a reserve, not a refuge. It was set aside for oil and gas 
development, not permanent preservation. Even as recently as the Obama 
administration, companies were encouraged to develop in the National 
Petroleum Reserve as opposed to other parts of Alaska.
  On the other hand, the Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience Area is 
necessary to help manage the impacts of climate change on our Arctic 
environments, including increased vessel traffic, moving fish stocks, 
marine debris, and increased military activity.
  We saw recently why the Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience Area 
needs to remain in place. NOAA developed the Northern Bering Sea 
Effects of Trawling Survey, an experiment to see the impacts of 
commercial bottom trawling in an area of the Bering Sea where it is 
currently banned.
  In their opposition to this project, the Northern Bering Sea Climate 
Resilience intertribal advisory council said that NOAA's plan perfectly 
illustrated the two reasons why the area was established in the first 
place: the history of the Bering Sea Tribes not being involved in 
policy discussions and decisions, and the threat of bottom trawling 
moving into the Northern Bering Sea ecosystem.
  By nullifying this area, we are breaking our promise to the Tribes 
and directly harming fishing communities. Alaskans face many challenges 
and threats to our unique ways of life. We are on the brink of being 
forced to import natural gas from a foreign country, and our fishermen 
are in the midst of an economic free fall, coupled with depleted fish 
stocks.
  Unfortunately, the way this bill was written puts energy development 
against fisheries, and for that reason I will be voting ``present'' 
today.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Pfluger).
  Mr. PFLUGER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman and my good friend, 
Mr. Stauber, for this bill.
  Let's just call it what it is. It is not a big secret that the Biden 
administration hates American energy. Since day one, they have waged a 
complete and all-out war on domestic production.
  If you take yourself back to 2019, then-candidate Biden said he would 
kill fossil fuels. I think they made good on that promise, and this is 
another example of that.
  In September 2023, the administration canceled existing oil and gas 
leases in the Coastal Plain of Alaska, violating statutorily mandated 
lease sales and suspending operations crucial to Alaska's economy. 
These actions were taken despite bipartisan opposition in Alaska as we 
just heard from our colleague across the aisle.
  H.R. 6285, a House Energy Action Team initiative, would reverse 
Biden's harmful anti-Alaska policies by reinstating mandated ANWR oil 
and gas leases and prohibiting a leasing moratorium in the Coastal 
Plain, and nullifying executive orders by the President.
  Just last week, the administration denied permission for the 
development of the Ambler Road, once again, superseding ongoing 
conversations at the State level.
  Alaskans should be able to decide what they want to develop, not the 
administration, but Alaskans who know Alaska.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank the RSC HEAT staff for their work on this 
legislation and Representative Stauber.
  Let me just respond to something that we have heard about Ukraine, 
about Russia, about the administration. Let me remind all Americans, 
Mr. Speaker, that it was this President in 2021 who refused to continue 
and to enhance the sanctions on the Nord Stream pipeline that would 
have helped all of Europe. It would have helped the Ukrainians more 
than anything.

  If you want to talk about being strong and standing up to Russia, 
let's take ourselves back to that point where this administration 
failed to do that, and instead handed Putin a huge gift and decided to 
declare an all-out war on American energy. This is just yet another 
example of that.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes.''
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership 
on the HEAT team.
  I will also point out to the American people that the Biden 
administration is the gift that keeps on giving to Putin. Not only 
would they not put sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, now they 
have put sanctions on U.S. pipelines.
  They have put a pause on LNG gas exports. Our friends in Europe, 
Germany, and Poland would love to have our LNG. They would love to have 
U.S. LNG, but guess what? We have got a lot of it, but we can't send it 
there because this President not only won't restrict Russia, he 
restricts American producers and allows Putin to continue to fund his 
war machine by selling gas to Europe.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, this is certainly a master class in 
deflection. I think perhaps the fact that a majority of the Republican 
Conference voted to hand Ukraine to Russia last week has touched a 
nerve as people have begun to consider the reality of that.
  Going back and trying to deflect to a pipeline from many years ago 
that no longer even functions, because it was blown up, certainly 
doesn't change the fact that last week when we had a chance to vote for 
critical lifeline military support for Ukraine as it fights for its 
survival against Russia, a significant majority of my colleagues across 
the aisle voted ``no.''
  They voted with Vladimir Putin and so congratulations on the 
deflection. Moscow Marge couldn't have done it any better. It might 
even make the highlight reel on RT tonight.
  I don't watch that network, but I just have to wonder if maybe there 
wouldn't be coverage of some of these things that we are hearing from 
across the aisle.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

                              {time}  1530

  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  I love the way my colleague across the aisle operates. He talks about 
deflecting when what he is doing is deflecting. He is trying to deflect 
from the issue in Alaska--where, once again, the Biden administration 
has failed miserably--by talking about Ukraine.
  I don't know if the gentleman has checked the voting record, but I 
voted to support Ukraine. It is regrettable that we have to send more 
foreign aid, more military equipment to support countries that are 
fighting against evil regimes like Putin, like Iran because of bad 
foreign policy, and a lot of it has to do with energy policy.
  I would prefer not to have to vote to send more military aid to our 
allies and our friends who are fighting for freedom and democracy, but 
this President and his administration has put us in a weakened place on 
the world stage, and, unfortunately, we have to take votes like that.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. 
Hern).
  Mr. HERN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the Alaska Right to 
Produce Act, and I thank my colleagues Pete Stauber and August Pfluger 
for the work with RSC's House Energy Action Team to put the legislation 
forward.
  Mr. Speaker, it has been noted here that we talk certain ways but 
vote others. I think nothing is more evident than what we just saw just 
a few minutes ago where the gentlewoman from Alaska supported the bill 
but is going to vote ``present.''
  You are either with Alaska or you are not. The Republicans are with 
Alaska. I just want to note for the record that we are going to vote to 
support Alaska.
  This legislation is only necessary because of the disastrous 
policymaking coming out of the Biden administration. It is hard to 
believe today that the national average for a gallon of gas in 2020 was 
just over $2. Under President Trump, the United States was well on our 
way not only to being energy independent, but energy dominant.

[[Page H2809]]

  Where do we and our allies get our oil from when we are not producing 
it ourselves? We get it from Russia, Venezuela, and other bad actors 
around the globe.
  Let's be clear: Halting domestic production of oil and gas does 
absolutely nothing to lower our dependence on oil and gas, as the 
climate lobby wants you to believe. It just increases our dependence on 
people like Vladimir Putin.
  I don't want the United States to rely on anything from Vladimir 
Putin. The solution is so simple: Use the resources under our own feet. 
The Alaska Right to Produce Act reverses the damaging policies from Joe 
Biden to unleash our domestic energy potential.
  Alaska has been blessed with tremendous oil and natural gas deposits, 
and the people of Alaska are incredibly supportive of utilizing those 
resources.
  This bill empowers the Native Alaskan communities and residents of 
the State to profit from the resources under their own soil. In a 
future where America is energy dominant, the only loser is Vladimir 
Putin, and others like him.
  It helps our allies when we can provide them with oil and gas so that 
they are not reliant on Putin, either. It helps our own people by 
lowering costs and providing cleaner, more affordable energy sources, 
and it helps Alaska reap the benefits of the resources in their land.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 15 seconds to the 
gentleman from Oklahoma.
  Mr. HERN. It is just common sense, and I urge my colleagues to vote 
``yes'' on this essential legislation.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I also appreciate Mr. Hern's leadership 
on the RSC and the establishment of the HEAT team and the efforts that 
they have been putting into making sure we are energy independent here 
in America.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, this is getting almost comical. I have now heard yet 
another speech pretending to oppose Vladimir Putin and Russia less than 
a week after the gentleman who just spoke voted to hand Ukraine over to 
Putin, voted ``no'' on essential military aid to our Ukrainian allies 
who are fighting for their very existence against this terrible war of 
aggression by Vladimir Putin made possible and financed, of course, by 
the fossil fuel industry in Russia, which American oil and gas 
companies truly helped to develop.
  You just have to wonder if there is not a lot of damage control 
underway right now across the aisle. Maybe folks realize just how 
reckless and dangerous that vote against Ukraine was last week, that 
vote that a majority, solid majority of my Republican friends took 
right along with Moscow Marge and the rest of the pro-Putin caucus.
  I am going to keep bringing this up each time I hear one of these 
anti-Ukraine voters pretend to care about Ukraine or pretend to oppose 
Vladimir Putin and Russia because last week they had a chance to 
actually show their colors, and we saw their colors.
  There is another way in which they are really doing a great favor to 
Vladimir Putin and Russia, and it is by opposing the clean energy 
transition at every turn and in every possible way. Vladimir Putin's 
worst nightmare is to break the fossil fuel paradigm that made him rich 
and powerful, that enabled him to have all this influence and leverage 
over Europe because a clean energy economy would make him irrelevant. 
It would make him a lot less powerful.
  Go ahead and keep helping Vladimir Putin with your votes, with your 
energy policy, but we are going to stand for a clean energy transition, 
and we are going to support Ukraine.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Washington (Mr. Newhouse), the chairman of the Western Caucus.
  Mr. NEWHOUSE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman of the Natural 
Resources Committee for allowing me to join in this conversation in 
support of the Alaska's Right to Produce Act.
  Alaska truly is blessed with abundant natural resources that could 
empower American energy and mineral dominance. Alaskan oil and gas 
production cannot be taken lightly. It is home to our Nation's fourth 
largest oil reserve and third largest gas reserve. It is so unfortunate 
that the President has made the political choice to lock up millions of 
acres where these resources could be utilized.
  The list of attacks on Alaskan energy production from this 
administration is long. Just 2 weeks ago, he added perhaps the most 
egregious example yet, when the Department of the Interior announced 
new restrictions on oil and gas development in the National Petroleum 
Reserve Alaska. These actions are not only detrimental to American 
energy production but also limit the future opportunities for 
prosperity in rural communities in Alaska that depend on energy 
projects.
  When you look at what Alaska wants, the result is clear. The majority 
of Tribal communities and Alaskan residents support resource 
development. Why? Because these projects bring in unprecedented income 
and development to communities that desperately want and need it.
  As chairman of the Western Caucus, I have been advocating for energy 
production across the United States of America. High domestic 
production keeps global prices down and ensures America is competitive 
with our global adversaries. That is why I am a staunch supporter of 
this bill to overturn the administration's restrictions on oil and gas 
development in the Last Frontier.
  I encourage all my colleagues to support this legislation to ensure 
robust, reliable production in Alaska, and I am proud to join my friend 
from Minnesota in support of the legislation to unleash the full 
potential of Alaskan energy.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I thank the gentleman from Washington for his refreshingly rare vote 
for Ukraine military aid and also the chairman, Mr. Westerman, for 
joining Democrats in that very important vote in the interests of our 
national security.
  I think, as we continue with this debate, it is worth talking about 
just what a fiscal and financial boondoggle drilling in the Arctic 
refuge is. It is, first of all, a proposition that is so deeply 
unpopular that the only way it became law was to sneak it into the 2017 
Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the Trump tax scam.
  Two lease sales were included in the legislation to partly offset tax 
cuts for the wealthy. Initially, Republicans in Congress and the Trump 
administration claimed that these lease sales would bring in $1.8 
billion in revenues for the Federal Government and the State of Alaska 
through bonus bids, and they proceeded to give a whole bunch of tax 
cuts away to billionaires and corporations on the basis of this 
illusory offset.
  Later, the Congressional Budget Office lowered the estimate to $900 
million, specifically $725 million for the first lease sale. Fast 
forward to the first lease sale that finally took place in 2021 in the 
final days of the Trump administration. Guess what happened? Well, it 
generated less than $15 million--not billion--in bonus bids, around 2 
percent of what even CBO's reduced estimate had projected.
  In 2022, two of those lessees actually asked BLM to cancel and refund 
their leases. They wanted out. Separately in 2021, two development 
companies, Chevron and Hilcorp, paid $10 million to get out, just to 
walk away from their legacy leases in the Arctic refuge. At least five 
major U.S. banks and 18 other international banks have said they won't 
finance drilling in the refuge.
  If my Republican colleagues are interested in Federal revenues, if 
they are interested in fiscal conservatism, I am sorry to say that the 
pristine Alaska wilderness is not their piggy bank, and, in any event, 
it turns out that it is empty.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  I just have to take issue with this issue about lackluster sales or 
lackluster lease sales. I note that the first ANWR lease sale was held 
in early 2021

[[Page H2810]]

during the throes of the COVID pandemic when oil prices were 
historically low, and the argument is that the administration 
projected, the Trump administration projected $1.8 billion from ANWR 
lease sales over 10 years, and my friends are arguing they only made 
less than 1 percent of those initial projections. They are not telling, 
as Paul Harvey would say, the rest of the story.
  This one sale was held after the election of President Biden who said 
on the campaign trail that he would end oil and gas production on 
Federal lands. I have to point out to my friends that revenue comes 
from oil and gas royalties based on production, not leasing.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Louisiana (Mr. Graves).
  Mr. GRAVES of Louisiana. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman of the 
Committee on Natural Resources for leading on this legislation.
  Mr. Chairman, I often wonder where in the world we are sometimes. We 
are under an administration that has set energy policies that are 
causing energy prices to go up, to increase for Americans.
  My friend from California's home State, I believe the average 
gasoline price in L.A. County right now is $5.40 a gallon. In my home 
State of Louisiana when President Biden took office, lowest gasoline 
prices were $1.74 a gallon.

  I struggle to understand why my friend from California would want to 
force their ideas and policies on the rest of the country. This is the 
State that is the most dependent State on Amazon Rainforest oil to 
power their State's economy. This is the State that has the least 
reliable energy grid in America, the State that has had the eighth-
worst emissions growth in the country, and, according to the American 
Lung Association, just last week, the State that has the dirtiest air 
over and over and over again in all of these cities including where my 
friend represents.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask my friend, please keep his ideas to himself. Ruin 
California, but don't ruin the rest of the country. Don't ruin the 
other 49 States.
  This is absolutely remarkable. We have watched as this administration 
comes in and does a ban on exporting American energy, on new exports of 
American energy, does a ban. That very tool would have been one of the 
most powerful tools available to actually reduce global emissions, but 
what my friend's policies are advocating and what they are supporting 
is supporting more Iranian energy because Iran is increasing their 
exports and filling the void.
  The Biden administration's own figures show that there is going to be 
a 50 percent growth in global energy demand, 57 percent increase in 
natural gas, and we have the cleanest sources of gas in the world.
  I don't understand why my friend thinks that it is better to cede 
this, to give this to Iran. This is the Biden administration's figures. 
I don't understand why my friend thinks we should cede this to Russia, 
why we should cede this to Venezuela.

                              {time}  1545

  President Biden facilitated. He lifted sanctions that allowed for the 
Nord Stream 2 pipeline to be built, the pipeline that took Russian 
energy and sent it into the European Union. Then, in the same breath, 
he blocked pipelines in the United States.
  Let's review. We support Russian energy and Russian pipelines. We 
support Iranian energy, including the $65 billion they got that has 
gone directly to funding groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and other 
terrorist groups that have killed American soldiers and invaded our 
ally, Israel.
  We have watched as these very strategies have resulted in emissions 
actually going up. As the United States has led the world in reducing 
emissions, for every ton we reduce, China has multiple times more 
increases.
  How many more times do we have to learn from these flawed energy 
strategies that harm America, enrich Venezuela, enrich Russia, enrich 
Iran, and harm the United States?
  There is evidence all over the place. We can sit here and have these 
emotional arguments all day long. Math and science prove these policies 
are flawed. This bill helps to address it, and the fact we are even 
here when a law already says you are supposed to open up leases, 
including in areas called the National Petroleum Reserve. That is 
right. It is reserved for wildlife. What? This is outrageous.
  The fact that we even have to be here doing this bill that the 
gentlewoman who represents the entire State of Alaska voted for in 
committee, that the gentlewoman who represents the entire State of 
Alaska has clearly said she will not oppose--yet, my friends from 
California are coming in and saying: Don't worry. We have the solution. 
We are going to impose our harmful strategies, our harmful energy 
policies, on you, as well. That way, maybe people stop leaving 
California.
  Mr. Speaker, I can't even begin to emphasize how important it is that 
we move forward with this legislation, that we treat American energy 
fairly. I urge adoption of this legislation.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I sometimes feel like, serving in this Congress, I need 
a good chiropractor because you just political whiplash one day to 
another, one week to another.
  Just now, my friend from Louisiana, in service of the fossil fuel 
agenda, made a sanctimonious speech opposing Russia and Vladimir Putin 
as if the whole country, the whole world, didn't watch his vote last 
week with the rest of his Republican Conference to hand Ukraine over to 
Russia, to vote ``no'' on critical military aid to Ukraine.
  It is like that. It is remarkable whiplash.
  My friend has the ability to actually criticize the air quality in 
California caused by catastrophic wildfires driven by the climate 
crisis caused by our fossil fuel addiction and suggests that that is 
because of California's climate agenda, which is absurd, while ignoring 
the fact that the one place of persistent air pollution and respiratory 
illness and other problems with air quality in California is in the oil 
patch, Bakersfield, former Speaker McCarthy's district where it is 
frankly a lot like Louisiana and Texas. It is pretty rich.
  Yet, we also have a Record if anybody is interested in cutting 
through the political theater and seeing where people really stand, 
including last week's vote against Ukraine.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. 
Castor).
  Ms. CASTOR of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend, Mr. 
Huffman, for yielding the time.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 6285.
  Mr. Speaker, while Democrats are working hard to lower the cost of 
living for Americans and protect our communities, House Republicans 
seek to make their lives much more expensive. They seek to pillage the 
places that make America special, the special places that we value.
  In doing so, here is the dirty secret: They are simply carrying the 
water for powerful special interests and polluters that have way too 
much power and influence here on Capitol Hill.
  Fortunately, H.R. 6285 has no chance of becoming law, but it does 
provide a glimpse of the GOP's alliance with polluters over the best 
interests of the American people.
  Whether we are talking about the Arctic refuge or my beautiful part 
of the country along the Gulf of Mexico, Republicans simply are aiming 
to sell out America's public lands and waters to their friends in Big 
Oil and the NRA.
  One of the six bills that were considered today would roll back the 
Biden administration's rules supporting conservation on public lands. 
Another would prohibit the government from regulating the use of toxic 
lead in ammunition. That is the single-largest source of unregulated 
lead discharged into our environment. The so-called Trust in Science 
Act would make it easier to hunt and kill the endangered gray wolf.
  The bill currently before us would threaten millions of acres of 
wildlands by mandating unfettered oil and gas development in the Arctic 
National Wildlife Refuge, regardless of the impacts on wildlife and 
nearby communities or what it will do to increase the costs of the 
overheating planet.

[[Page H2811]]

  We have to ask ourselves if this is really what the American people 
are asking the Congress to do right now. Does the average American 
really want to see Congress make it easier to pollute and needlessly 
develop our special places, our wildlife refuges? I don't think so.
  There is an incredible contrast right now in our country between when 
it comes to who is on the side of the people and who is standing up to 
the polluters. We just celebrated the 54th Earth Day. Look at the 
actions of President Biden compared to the Republican pro-polluter 
messaging bills.
  First, last week, the Department of the Interior finalized a new rule 
that would protect more than 13 million acres of irreplaceable wildlife 
habitat in the Western Arctic.

  Then, President Biden announced the creation of the American Climate 
Corps, kind of modeled after the Conservation Corps of decades ago. It 
is a groundbreaking initiative that will put more than 20,000 young 
Americans to work, protecting our communities, building environmental 
infrastructure, and helping us to lower costs and be more resilient to 
the rising costs of the overheating climate.
  Last but not least, the EPA rolled out awards under a new Solar for 
All initiative, a $7 billion grant to help deliver cleaner, cheaper 
energy across this great country, especially to working-class 
communities that really need help on their electric bills. This is 
going to be a godsend in my State, the so-called Sunshine State. We are 
going to help families put rooftop solar on their roofs, lower their 
electric bills.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the 
gentlewoman from Florida.
  Ms. CASTOR of Florida. Because I couldn't help our good friend from 
Louisiana when he was talking about how unfettered oil and gas will 
really help lower bills, on the front page of my hometown paper today, 
the Tampa Bay Times, was a story about why our electric bills are so 
high. Do you know why they are so high? Because in the so-called 
Sunshine State, 75 percent of electricity is generated from gas. Our 
utilities are keeping us hooked on gas.
  That is why Solar for All, helping to unleash the abundant, free 
energy from the sun to help lower electric bills, is vital.
  It is time for the House to get serious about cleaner, cheaper 
energy. Enough with these messaging bills. Let's move to bipartisan 
legislation that will help us achieve a prosperous, sustainable future. 
Banning offshore oil drilling off of the beautiful Florida coast is 
where we should start.
  Mr. Speaker, I hope my colleagues will join me in voting for the 
motion to recommit.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my 
amendment in the Record immediately prior to the vote on the motion to 
recommit.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentlewoman from Florida?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I would also point out that if our friends 
across the aisle are so concerned with American energy bills, you would 
think they would at some point say no to the LNG export extravaganza 
that all serious economic analysis shows is driving up U.S. energy 
prices. Yet, they continue to come to this floor to introduce 
legislation and advocate against the commonsense pause that the Biden 
administration has taken so that we can look at the impacts of more LNG 
export infrastructure on U.S. energy prices as well as our climate 
crisis.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, a lot of things to contest here and issues to cover, but 
I want to start with this idea of environmental treasures and this idea 
that ANWR is this environmental treasure that was never intended for 
any kind of development. Let's look at a little history.
  When ANWR was created in 1980, the law included a section, section 
1002, setting aside 1.5 million acres of the coastal plain to be 
assessed for its development potential. After years of careful study, 
in 1987, the Department of the Interior recommended that the 1002 Area 
be open to responsible development projects.
  The Alaska Native village of Kaktovik, which has public interest in 
the lands in ANWR and multiple entities as members of Voice, is the 
sole community located in the 1002 Area of ANWR and the only community 
located in all of the over 19 million acres of ANWR.
  The president of Kaktovik Inupiat Corporation testified: ``We are a 
small community that suffers as the Federal winds blow and feel the 
Biden administration is working to effectively erase us from the land 
that we have inhabited for hundreds of years. Since 1980, we have 
fought to open the 1002 Area, also known as the coastal plain, to oil 
drilling and pursue economic freedom.''
  On to another issue that my friend from California mentioned about 
the poor air quality there due to forest fires: if my colleagues would 
work with us on that, we could fix that issue, as well.
  What California has is very poor forest management. They have a 
hands-off approach to forest management. As a result of that, we are 
even losing giant sequoias. As much as 20 percent of the ones on the 
planet we lost in 2 years due to catastrophic wildfire were not because 
of climate change but because fire had been suppressed in those groves 
for over 100 years. They finally had to pay the piper. You had white 
fir trees that grew up into the lower canopy of the giant sequoias. My 
colleague from California knows I am a forester and would love to help 
fix some of those problems with forests in California.
  Now, to this issue about energy cost and reliability, as my friends 
across the aisle are pushing for more and more solar and wind, I am an 
all-of-the-above energy kind of guy. I would love to have more solar 
and wind, but we have to have baseload power. We have to have either 
coal or natural gas or a lot more hydro or a lot more nuclear power.
  Going back to an earlier discussion that nuclear power is generated 
from uranium and that we are now dependent on Russia, we have to buy 
our uranium--most of it--from Russia or Kazakhstan to generate our 
nuclear power.
  When we talk about low-cost solar energy, I have a real problem with 
that. Maybe it is low cost in the United States because we pay solar 
farm developers 30 percent of their costs with our tax dollars. If you 
build a solar farm, you get a 30 percent tax credit back. If you spend 
a million dollars, you get $300,000 back from your fellow taxpayers. If 
you build a windmill, you get 2.7 cents per kilowatt hour.
  Maybe that is a way that it is lower cost, but if it is truly lower 
cost, why is the number one manufacturer of solar farms in the world 
building 50 gigawatts of coal power plants every year? That is China, 
which we rely on to buy not only the elements and minerals that we need 
to do electrification but also builds most of the solar panels with 
Uyghur slave labor. They are building a big coal plant every 5 days.

                              {time}  1600

  Now, natural gas in the United States has caused us to be able to 
reduce global greenhouse gas emissions more than any other country in 
the world. We are only around 13 percent of the global greenhouse gas 
emissions now, and China is over twice that.
  When we become more dependent on China, when we become more dependent 
on Russia, who are big polluters, then we are becoming more responsible 
for global greenhouse gas emissions than if we would use our own energy 
and our own minerals to build things here, to build them more 
efficiently and more effectively than any place in the world.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I am glad to hear the gentleman from Arkansas talk about 
energy subsidies and to criticize the subsidies that he believes should 
be questioned for clean energy.
  I hope he has the same concern about the much greater amount of 
subsidy, especially if you consider all the environmental externalities 
that taxpayers just pick up the tab for and have for the past hundred 
years when it comes to the fossil fuel industry.

[[Page H2812]]

  There is a lot of work we could do together to take inappropriate 
subsidies out of U.S. energy policy, and I hope the gentleman would be 
interested in that.
  I want to assure him when it comes to the forestry and trees and air 
quality part of our conversation that the wildfires and the air quality 
problems in California, because of them, are not something you can log 
your way out of.
  I know the gentleman is interested in forest management, and there is 
a lot that we could work on there together as well for healthy forests. 
Some of the worst wildfires in California that produced the worst air 
quality were through heavily cutover land where there had been all the 
clear-cutting anybody could ever want.
  The same can be said for some of the terrible Canadian wildfires last 
year that gave us awful air quality right here in Washington, D.C. Much 
of that ripped right through heavily cutover, clear-cut land.
  Logging, you know, is not the simple solution to these problems. A 
better solution is to step back and realize the climate crisis that is 
driving it and to begin working together to actually reduce the worst 
impacts of that crisis.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time. I am 
prepared to close, and I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close as well and yield 
myself the balance of my time.
  Mr. Speaker, obviously, I oppose this bill. We have massive 
wildfires, prolonged droughts, stronger hurricanes, and coastal 
flooding. All across this country, our communities are feeling the 
increased severity and frequency of tragic events from the climate 
crisis, sending us dire warnings.
  The crisis is real, it is here, and we need to act now for the sake 
of this planet and future generations.
  In the Arctic, temperatures are rising four times faster than the 
global average. In the indigenous communities in northern Alaska who 
are so disproportionately facing the devastating impacts of the climate 
crisis, we must also pay attention to the impacts on them.
  The melting permafrost is creating our country's first but not last 
climate refugees. Changing species migration patterns are threatening 
food security and cultural continuity. Oil and gas development only 
exacerbates all of these impacts.
  Of course, not all Alaskans, including indigenous Alaskans, share the 
same perspective on oil and gas development. Native American Tribes are 
not a monolith.
  You can bet that whenever my friends across the aisle can find some 
indigenous individual or advocacy group or other entity that supports 
oil and gas development, they are going to wrap themselves around 
Tribal consultation and pretend to be great champions for Indian 
Country.
  In many other votes, when Indian Country opposes pipelines and dams 
and mining projects and other things that are against their interests, 
I am afraid the Tribes are thrown under the bus by my Republican 
friends pretty much every time.
  Revenue from extraction often supports local governments and 
indigenous regional and village corporations.
  That is part of the consideration in Alaska, but in so many cases, 
the tradeoffs create unacceptable impacts as well. That is why it is 
not a monolith when you talk to indigenous communities in Alaska.
  This bill is an instrument of blunt force that allows for extraction 
across Alaska in places that are too special and too fragile to drill.

  It would reinstate oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife 
Refuge, an area known to the Gwich'in people as ``The sacred place 
where life begins.'' These were leases the Biden administration 
canceled because they were based on shoddy Trump-era analyses.
  The bill would withdraw the administration's rule to protect over 13 
million acres of public land in the NPR-A, a region that is already 
feeling the impacts of oil and gas development.
  It would undo protection of 125 million acres of the Arctic Ocean 
from offshore drilling, and it would undo the reinstatement of the 
Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience Area. In the Bering Sea, an oil 
spill would be beyond detrimental. It would be catastrophic.
  Rolling back these protections is the wrong approach. We can't simply 
give these lands and waters away to the highest bidder.
  I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this bill and yield back the 
balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  To close, I am going to quote from the testimony of Charles Lampe, 
the President of the Kaktovik Inupiat Corporation who testified on the 
Biden administration's action in November.

       We do not approve of efforts to turn our homeland into one 
     giant national park, which literally guarantees us a fate 
     with no economy, no jobs, reduced subsistence, and no hope 
     for the future of our people.

  I urge all my colleagues to show their support for Alaska and the 
Alaska Native communities on the North Slope by voting for this bill, 
and I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. All time for debate on the bill has expired.


                 Amendment No. 1 Offered by Mr. Stauber

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 
1 printed in House Report 118-477.
  Mr. STAUBER. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
  The text of the amendment is as follows:

       Add at the end the following:

     SEC. 7. DESIGNATION OF SPECIAL AREAS OF THE NATIONAL 
                   PETROLEUM RESERVE IN ALASKA.

       Beginning on the date of enactment of this Act, the 
     Secretary may not designate any new Special Areas, add 
     resource values to existing Special Areas, or expand existing 
     Special Areas in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska 
     unless an Act of Congress enacted after the date of enactment 
     of this Act specifically authorizes the Secretary to do so.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 1173, the 
gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Stauber) and a Member opposed each will 
control 5 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. STAUBER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I rise to offer my amendment that strengthens the underlying 
legislation to prevent the Biden administration from taking further 
steps to block oil and gas production in the great State of Alaska.
  In the Bureau of Land Management's press release announcing the final 
NPR-A rule, they teased future action by the administration to create 
new special areas or expand/adjust existing special areas within the 
boundaries of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. These special 
areas are a means to lock up acreage from oil and gas production. There 
is no disputing that.
  My amendment prohibits the Department of the Interior from creating 
or expanding special areas without congressional authorization.
  When the administration announced its moratorium and canceled leases 
in ANWR and withdrew millions of acreage from development within the 
NPR-A, the local Alaska Native communities on the North Slope weren't 
given a proper heads-up, just like members of the Navajo Nation heard 
about the Chaco Canyon withdrawal. Alaska Native community leaders 
learned of these policy changes in the media.
  This administration did not even properly consult with the very 
communities this oil and gas development would benefit, and it is clear 
why, because they weren't in lockstep with the administration's 
policies.
  Mr. Speaker, just this morning we had a hearing. I asked the 
Secretary of the Interior five times if she consulted with the North 
Slope Native American communities, and she would not answer.
  I finally had to go get some emails where they requested a meeting 
with her, and she denied meeting with them.
  Let's make it very clear. The Alaskans on the North Slope requested a 
meeting with the Secretary of the Interior prior to this rule, and she 
blew them off. She didn't have the courtesy to meet with them after she 
was up there in Alaska already.
  The administration also held an incredibly short public comment 
period on these actions. When the Bureau of Land Management was pressed 
on this

[[Page H2813]]

timeline, which was right in the middle of whaling season for the 
sustenance fishing communities that support oil and gas development, a 
BLM official responded that the administration wanted a short comment 
period to rush a rule through in order to prevent it from falling into 
the Congressional Review Act window.
  Mr. Speaker, not only did this administration fail to properly 
consult with local Native Alaskan communities on the North Slope, but 
they have taken explicit steps to subvert Congress' constitutional 
responsibility to serve as a check on the executive branch.
  This administration cannot be trusted to do right by the American 
people. Policies coming out of this administration, especially energy 
and natural resources policies, undermine the American people and the 
hardworking men and women who stand ready to responsibly develop our 
vast natural resources.
  That is why Congress must take every step to prevent the 
administration from pushing forward these policies. We must close every 
loophole that might be out there to shut down domestic energy 
production.
  This includes preventing the administration from creating new or 
expanding existing special areas within the NPR-A.
  They can't be trusted to do the right thing by the American people 
and the Alaska Native communities on the North Slope.
  Congress must step in. I urge my colleagues to join me in voting for 
this amendment, as well as joining me in voting for the underlying 
legislation.
  The Alaskan communities deserve this. They have been producing energy 
under their feet in their natural resource space for years.
  The energy production--we want to be energy independent, and again, 
the oil and gas royalties will help the North Slope communities, Mr. 
Speaker.
  I said 10 minutes ago they had come to an EMR hearing stating that 
these royalties help us live, help us buy our food, help us build our 
infrastructure. Without those revenues, they can't do it. They simply 
can't do it. In fact, at the EMR hearing, there was a resident that 
actually was in tears, Mr. Speaker, because of this rule. It is going 
to be devastating for her and her family to not be able to live on the 
North Slope comfortably.
  Actually, Mr. Speaker, my good friend from Louisiana, I actually 
liked his expression, and I think my colleague on the other side of the 
aisle may be offended by this, but you know, my good friend from 
Louisiana actually said--
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from California is recognized 
for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  We have a process problem. Last week, the Rules Committee issued a 
notice for amendment submission for this bill, and 16 amendments were 
submitted: 12 from Democrats, 4 from Republicans.
  We really should be having an open, robust, and lively debate, but 
no. The amendment debate this afternoon will be really quick because 
all six Natural Resources bills up this week, with all six of those 
bills, this is the only bill that was open to any amendments, and 
Republicans made only one, this one, this fossil fuel industry wish. 
That was the only one made in order.
  Republicans have made a mockery of what they promised, and they 
boasted about back in the early days of this Congress.

  They guaranteed it would be a robust and open process. Half the time, 
the Rules Committee isn't even open, but when it is, it is cooking the 
books like we see this week with this one single amendment for us to 
debate.
  With other bills that have been up this afternoon, the so-called 
Mining Regulatory Clarity Act, my colleague, Representative Leger 
Fernandez, filed several amendments, amendments that Ranking Member 
Grijalva previously offered at the bill's markup.
  They would prevent foreign bad actors, for example, including 
adversaries like China from mining our Federal lands, something that is 
all too common today through their thinly veiled American subsidiaries, 
but no, that was not ruled in order, so we don't get to talk about it.
  Yesterday at the Rules Committee hearing, Chair Westerman told us he 
didn't accept the amendment because it wasn't worded properly.
  Well, this language was already in the Republicans' prized H.R. 1 
where it was included as a Republican amendment, so it is hard to take 
that argument seriously.
  Maybe they realized H.R. 1 would never become law and that is why 
more than a year later, Republicans still haven't sent that bill even 
to the Senate, or maybe they realized foreign bad actors also happen to 
be padding their pockets.

                              {time}  1615

  If that is not the case, I am eager to continue working across the 
aisle to get these bad actors off our Federal lands, and we will be 
following up.
  Now, back to Alaska. The amendment we are here to debate would do 
nothing but make the bill more extreme. It would prevent the 
administration from designating any further special areas without an 
act of Congress, preventing further protections for an area that is so 
fragile, special, and ecologically important.
  They blocked debate on every other amendment, including my amendment 
to require a study on the impacts to subsistence resources, another to 
prohibit the Secretary from issuing the lease sale until revenue is 
raised at least to the level that CBO estimates, and one to prohibit 
oil and gas leasing in the Arctic Ocean.
  Representative Peltola, the sole House Representative for Alaska, 
filed an amendment to protect the critically important Northern Bering 
Sea Climate Resilience Area, but Republicans refused to let that 
proceed. This is not good faith debate.
  I will end with a word about my friend's statement that he asked 
Secretary Haaland repeatedly about Tribal consultation. My friend would 
have been well-served to listen to Secretary Haaland and learn a thing 
or two about Tribal consultation. She is the highest-ranking indigenous 
person in American history. She knows a thing or two about this 
subject, including the fact that a nonprofit advocacy group, which is 
the consultation that my friend was referring to, is not a group she 
has to meet with or consult as part of Tribal consultation.
  Tribal consultation is government to government. That is how it 
works. If there was a little more listening and a little less screaming 
and table-pounding, there might be a better understanding of Tribal 
consultation across the aisle.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote, and I yield back the balance of my 
time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the previous question 
is ordered on the bill and on the amendment offered by the gentleman 
from Minnesota (Mr. Stauber).
  The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from 
Minnesota (Mr. Stauber).
  The amendment was agreed to.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on engrossment and third 
reading of the bill.
  The bill was ordered to be engrossed and read a third time, and was 
read the third time.


                           Motion to Recommit

  Ms. CASTOR. Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will report the motion to 
recommit.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Ms. Castor of Florida moves to recommit the bill H.R. 6285 
     to the Committee on Natural Resources.

  The material previously referred to by Ms. Castor of Florida is as 
follows:

       Ms. Castor of Florida moves to recommit the bill H.R. 6285 
     to the Committee on Natural Resources with instructions to 
     report the same back to the House forthwith, with the 
     following amendment:
       Add at the end the following:

     SEC. 7. PROHIBITION OF OIL AND NATURAL GAS PRELEASING, 
                   LEASING, AND RELATED ACTIVITIES IN CERTAIN 
                   AREAS OFF THE COAST OF FLORIDA.

       Section 18 of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (43 
     U.S.C. 1344) is amended by adding at the end the following:
       ``(j) Prohibition of Oil and Natural Gas Preleasing, 
     Leasing, and Related Activities in Certain Areas Off the 
     Coast of Florida.--

[[Page H2814]]

       ``(1) Prohibition.--Notwithstanding any other provision of 
     this section or any other law, the Secretary may not offer 
     for oil and gas leasing, preleasing, or any related activity 
     any tract located in--
       ``(A) any area of the Eastern Gulf of Mexico that is 
     referred to in section 104(a) of the Gulf of Mexico Energy 
     Security Act of 2006;
       ``(B) the portion of the South Atlantic Planning Area south 
     of 30 degrees 43 minutes North Latitude; or
       ``(C) the Straits of Florida Planning Area.
       ``(2) Limitation on effect.--Nothing in this subsection 
     affects any right under any lease issued under this Act 
     before the date of enactment of this subsection.''.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule XIX, the 
previous question is ordered on the motion to recommit.
  The question is on the motion to recommit.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the noes appeared to have it.
  Ms. CASTOR of Florida. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and 
nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further 
proceedings on this question are postponed.

                          ____________________