Deb Haaland’s big day is finally here.
Tomorrow (Tuesday) morning, the Senate Energy Committee will take up President Biden’s nomination of Congresswoman Deb Haaland to serve as secretary of the interior.
Set your calendar for 7:30 am local time. The hearing will be broadcast live on the Energy Committee’s website: http://energy.senate.gov
The Energy Committee is not exactly friendly territory for a congresswoman who stood against the Keystone Pipeline and called for a ban on fracking. But that’s just the fight the Biden administration expects over their push to install the woman responsible for implementing Biden’s moratorium on new oil and gas leases.
As we reported last week, big oil companies (and the senators who take their money) are already lining up the opposition research and organizing to derail this nomination if Haaland shows any vulnerabilities.
She will have some friendly faces in the room, however. Our own Senator Martin Heinrich will introduce Haaland along with Senator Don Young, Republican of Alaska. DC insiders have noted that Young’s willingness to cross party lines was somewhat unexpected, but then again Alaska has a huge Native population and a lot of public lands. Young is likely betting that Haaland will ultimately get confirmed and he’d like her to owe him one.
Heinrich engaged a similar strategy when he voted for Trump’s interior nominee David Berhardt in April 2019. Four months later, Bernhart toured Chaco Canyon with Heinrich where the secretary promised to exempt Chaco from Trump’s expanded federal oil and gas leases.
Even if Haaland get the nod from the Senate Energy Committee, there is no guarantee that she will get a majority of votes in the full senate – the final step in confirmation.
While Sen. Young seems open to crossing party lines, Democrats can rarely afford to lose any votes and there are plenty of energy-country Democrats anxious about canceling fossil fuels.
Notably, West Virginia’s Joe Manchin, the Energy Committee chairman, told NBC News today he’s still undecided. Democrats can’t afford to lose a single vote.
Grab your popcorn (or, more likely, a bigger cup of coffee for the 7:30 a.m. hearing!). Read up on what to expect from tomorrow’s hearing:
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