A proposal to sell off up to 3 million acres of public lands across the West is in limbo after the Senate parliamentarian ruled it out of the reconciliation bill.
A controversial proposal to sell off millions of acres of public lands across Western states — including large swaths of California — was stripped Monday from Republican’s tax and spending bill for violating Senate rules.
Senator Mike Lee (R–Utah) had advanced a mandate to sell up to 3.3 million acres of public land managed by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management for the stated purpose of addressing housing needs — an intent that opponents didn’t believe was guaranteed by the language in the provision.
Late Monday, Elizabeth MacDonough, the Senate parliamentarian — who advises the government body on interpreting procedural rules — determined the proposal didn’t pass muster under the the Byrd Rule, which prevents the inclusion of provisions that are extraneous to the budget in a reconciliation bill.
The move initially appeared to scuttle Lee’s plan, which has drawn bipartisan backlash. But Lee, chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, took to the social media platform X to say the fight wasn’t over.
