A deeply unpopular, controversial proposal to sell off public lands for private purchase and development — tucked into a massive budget reconciliation bill — has been blocked by the Senate parliamentarian, Axios reported.
Although a similar House proposal initially failed in May, Utah Sen. Mike Lee "revived" it and released a draft version June 11, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
As written, Lee's land sale proposal went much further than the previous version did — had it passed with the larger budget bill, it would have forced the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to sell between 2.2 million and 3.3 million acres of public land spanning 11 states to private buyers.
"Washington has proven, time and again, it can't manage this land. This bill puts it in better hands," Lee stated. However, polling in May indicated that a staggering 74% of Americans opposed any sale of public lands.
Lee has asserted that the proposed sale of millions of acres of public land would enable the construction of "affordable housing," a claim that has been widely disputed.
"Housing advocates have cautioned that federal land is not universally suitable for affordable housing," partly because of its distance from population centers, PBS reported. As Axios pointed out, the land sale provision's phrasing suspiciously didn't "require homes built on the land to meet any standard for affordability," raising concerns the privatized land would be used for ski villas and private vacation homes.
On Monday, nonpartisan Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough struck several provisions from the budget reconciliation bill, all of which were detailed in a press release. Among them was Lee's proposed sale of public lands.
Lee's measure fell afoul of the Byrd Rule, per the press release. The rule, named after the late former Senate Majority Leader Robert Byrd, prohibits provisions unrelated to taxing and spending from being added to budget bills.
That same day, in a post to Bluesky urging Americans to vocally oppose the measure, the Natural Resources Defense Council described the proposal as "a fire sale of over 3 million acres of public lands" affecting an area larger than Connecticut.
"Families would lose access to some of their favorite trails and parks close to home. Once the land is sold and the no-trespassing signs go up, there is no going back," the NRDC warned.
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Definitely 👍 On Tuesday, one day after the Senate parliamentarian axed the land sale provision, lawmakers vowed to be vigilant about Lee's third attempt to resuscitate the motion. Washington Sen. Maria Cantwell was among them.
"I don't trust [Sen. Lee], and I don't trust his process," said Cantwell, per the Washington State Standard. "We will be here to the last minute, making sure that they do not succeed in putting this into a bill, and if they do, we will be there with an amendment fighting it tooth and nail on the floor."
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