Rep. Mary Peltola may be a member of the Western Caucus, just like she’s a member of the Blue Dog Democrats, and the Women Democrats Caucus. It’s a club membership thing among like-minded lawmakers.
But when the Western Caucus heralded key legislation that passed the House to help Alaska’s energy-based economy, the “Alaska’s Right to Produce Act,” Peltola’s name was nowhere to be seen in the press release.
Peltola was also not mentioned by the Voice of the Arctic, which issued a press release expressing thanks to the House of Representatives for passing the Alaska’s Right to Produce Act.
“Quyanaqpak @RepPeteStauber and all those who voted today to support Indigenous self-determination on the North Slope by advancing HR 6285, or the ‘Alaska’s Right to Produce Act.’ The Senate must quickly take up and pass this bill,” said Voice of the Arctic on X/Twitter.
The Biden administration’s decisions are not aligned with the North Slope Iñupiat after it grossly mismanaged the public engagement process and cut local Indigenous elected officials out of policy discussions, said Voice of the Arctic.
“DOI Secretary Haaland herself has ignored or denied at least eight meeting requests by North Slope elected Indigenous leadership, including during her visit to Alaska in the fall of 2023,” the group said.
“Since the Biden administration announced this decision in September, our voices, which overwhelmingly reject the federal government’s decisions, have been consistently drowned out and ignored,” Voice of the Arctic Iñupiat President Nagruk Harcharek wrote. “This administration has not followed its well-documented promises to work with Indigenous people when crafting policies affecting their lands and people. We are grateful to Congress for exercising its legislative authority to correct the federal government’s hypocrisy and advance Iñupiaq self-determination in our ancestral homelands.”
The Western Caucus statement effusively praised Rep. DanNewhouse and Rep. Pete Stauber, as defenders of Alaska, ignoring Peltola, who had reversed her support of the bill at the last minute.
H.R. 6285, Alaska’s Right to Produce Act, overturns the Biden Administration’s anti-energy restrictions in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska (NPR-A) and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). The legislation, introduced by Rep. Stauber, passed by a bipartisan vote of 214 – 199 – 2,” the Western Caucus announced, without mentioning the only Alaska representative in Congress sat out the vote and just marked herself “present.”
Peltola, meanwhile, had instructed Democrats in Congress to vote “no” when the bill came up for a vote last week.
Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan also thanked the House for passing the resolution, again without mentioning Peltola:
“I want to thank my House colleagues for passing Alaska’s Right to Produce Act, a bill to reverse the Biden administration’s lock-up of more than half of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A), and to undo the illegal decisions by the administration to cancel lawfully awarded leases in the non-wilderness Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). I want to give a special shout-out to my friend @RepPeteStauber, a fierce advocate for energy dominance and for the Alaska Native people on the North Slope, who overwhelmingly oppose the Biden administration’s lock-up of their lands and whose voices have been silenced and cancelled by this administration. I’ve sponsored an identical bill in the Senate, and am hoping that the passage in the House gives us momentum. Alaska has a right to produce our own energy for the sake of quality economic opportunities and good-paying jobs, and for the energy security of the entire nation.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who has been in the Senate since 2002, stayed silent about the House passage of Alaska’s Right to Produce Act, which has a companion bill in the Senate that Sullivan and Murkowski introduced in November.
Under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, former President Donald Trump established an oil and gas leasing program in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, in an area long ago set aside for oil and gas. The restricted energy development in the Coastal Plain of ANWR to 2,000 acres, and production could mean development of an estimated 10.4 billion barrels of oil.
On Sept. 6, 2023, the Biden Department of Interior announced plans to cancel all seven remaining oil and gas leases issued under the Trump administration in ANWR and at the same time locked up 13 million of acres within the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. Both actions were taken without notice to the Alaska Native communities most impacted by these decisions.
Read the full text of the bill here.
Murkowski last week introduced legislation last week. that would add millions of dollars to research menopause.
