The top Republican on the House Natural Resources Committee says he is willing to work with Democrats on climate change legislation, but not before they stop grandstanding and start working within the panel’s jurisdiction.
“When they finally get off the [public relations] fluff road, and start doing something of substance, we will respond with issues of substance,” Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, told the Washington Examiner during an exclusive interview at his Capitol Hill office.
It’s not unrealistic that the GOP would work with Democrats on public lands legislation that addresses greenhouse gas emissions. “We did in the past, we’ll do it now, we’ll do it going forward,” Bishop said.
Bishop’s criticism of the Democrat-led committee is not that it has addressed climate change, but how it has done so. He questions the relevance of the Democratic agenda to the topics within the committee’s purview, such as the Department of Interior and its oversight of lands, forests, animal habitat, and park land.
Bishop has criticized the committee chairman, Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., for holding seven hearings on climate change last month that he argues were squarely outside the jurisdiction of the committee.
Democrats are struggling to pull together their agenda, Bishop said, because they have been out of power for a long time and are now having to get their bearings as the majority.
Bishop, 67, served as chairman of the Natural Resources Committee for the past two congressional sessions until the Democrats took back the House in last year’s midterm elections. He has served in the House since 2003, after stints as a state lawmaker and as a public school teacher.
Bishop is from the West, where the federal government holds sway over vast amounts of land, making him sensitive to policies that affect states’ access to land and natural resources.
Bishop argues the committee can address climate change, but that it can do so through proper forest management practices, public lands restoration, reducing the frequency of wildfires in the West, and opening up federal lands to livestock grazing.
[Related: How a top Republican aims to resist the Democratic climate change agenda]
“You can take more carbon out of the air through proper use of grazing on public lands than you can by any kind of banning of any infrastructure or transportation option,” Bishop said, alluding to the progressive agenda laid out by Democrats in the Green New Deal. An early fact sheet for the Green New Deal had suggested banning jet airliners to reduce emissions.
What is needed, in Bishop’s estimation, is proper land management practices that help sequester carbon dioxide by ensuring a stable area for grasses and other plant life to flourish.
“Plant life needs carbon to survive,” he explained. Plants, in turn, produce oxygen and become feed for livestock, he noted.
But the hearings the Democrats have held so far have mostly been on topics outside those policy areas and thus, in Bishop’s eyes, outside of the scope of the committee’s jurisdiction.
Bishop condemns the committee’s activity this year as grandstanding for the sake of media coverage and PR.
“You tell me how concussions in the NFL relates to climate change, then we can have a good discussion,” Bishop answered, referring to one of the committee’s last climate hearings, focused on the effects of climate change on public health and corporate misinformation campaigns.
Republicans were able to adjourn that hearing through a rarely successful procedural maneuver. The minority held a vote on jurisdiction at the hearing and won because only two Democrats showed up.
Bishop said that hearing, in particular, was revealing of the two parties’ respective levels of interest.
“I think one of the things that people have been noticing is … they have never had a hearing where more than seven Democrats have shown up,” he said. “Our side doesn’t show up either, but the Democrats aren’t showing up.”
Of course, Chairman Grijalva doesn’t buy Bishop’s jurisdictional claims. In a letter replying to Bishop’s charges, Grijalva said the GOP’s claims are unfounded.
Bishop says the Democrats will come around once they need to pass legislation. Then the GOP will be ready to talk seriously about the jurisdiction issue and how to address it. But for now, the Republicans are playing the waiting game.
“People are going to be appreciative of the options and the values that we are going to bring in. But I have to wait until they go into substance,” he said. “It’s got to be when the fluff era is over and they want to talk about real issues.”
