Puffy, Feathered Sticking Point of a $612 Billion House Bill
WASHINGTON — Representative Bruce Westerman, an Arkansas Republican, spoke for many Americans this week when he conceded during a House hearing that he had never laid eyes on a sage grouse. Had he seen one, he surmised, he would have thought "a bobwhite quail got friendly with a Dominecker hen."
But a Republican maneuver on the $612 billion military bill to block the Interior Department from adding the bird to the endangered species list has set off a major congressional skirmish that has spilled over into Western states, where the sage grouse is revered, and among environmental groups that fear a steady erosion of the Endangered Species Act.
The attempt to circumvent protections for the sage grouse — fluffy, with a formidable chest once puffed, chickenlike yet more proud — as well those for the lesser prairie chicken and the American burying beetle is part of an ambitious push that House Republicans have pursued since retaking the majority in 2010 to roll back, limit or unravel environmental regulations.