Joe Biden’s 2024 campaign slogan is “Let’s finish the job,” but based on his administration’s latest proposed abuse of federal law, it should be “Lizards over People.”
If you haven’t been following Biden’s latest assault on Texas, our oil and natural gas industry, and most critically, our public and higher education systems, that new slogan may sound silly. But unfortunately, it is anything but silly—it is severe, and as your Texas Land Commissioner, I’m taking the fight to the federal government to stop it.
This all comes down to the potential designation of the Dunes Sagebrush Lizard as an endangered species by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS), which would cause the limitation or outright prohibition of surface activities in its habitat.
This matters because the two-inch Dunes Sagebrush Lizard resides primarily in the Permian Basin of West Texas—the beating heart of our state and nation’s oil and natural gas industry.
Or at least the federal government “thinks” it resides there. The fact of the matter is that the USFWS has admitted that the habitat for these lizards isn’t determinable at this time. Yet they are moving forward with adding this lizard to the endangered species list, which would cripple current and future energy production across this region.
How can we have an honest public debate about the merits of this proposed action if the federal government cannot even agree on where this species resides? It’s absolute madness, and the stakes are high—not only for American energy production but also for Texas education.
As the state’s Land Commissioner, I steward over 13 million acres of Texas lands on behalf of the taxpayer. Many of these state lands are rich in natural resources and produce billions of dollars in benefits for Texans.
The largest beneficiary of these energy-producing lands is our state public and higher education systems. For example, just last year the state lands we manage contributed a record $2.1 billion to public schools in Texas.
The reckless actions by Biden and his USFWS directly threaten the quality of every Texas public school child's education. I won’t stand for it.
Beyond the inability of the federal government to properly define where this lizard resides, there are numerous other problems with their proposal.
First, the Permian Basin has been producing oil and natural gas since the first well was discovered in 1926. After nearly 100 years of increasingly responsible energy production, there is no evidence that the Dunes Sagebrush Lizard population has been negatively affected by surface activity.
In fact, a recent study that the Biden administration even cites in its proposal concluded that this species’ population is actually increasing, making the move for more federal protection even more baffling.
Next, the proposal relies heavily on what “could” happen to this lizard in a Doomsday “Climate Change” Scenario. Even while admitting the “impacts of extreme heat and drought on individual dunes sagebrush lizards are relatively unknown,” the USFWS goes on to argue, rather unsurely, that drought “could impact [the lizard’s] food resources.”
So, they are proposing to destroy our domestic energy engine because it “could” get hotter and drier, which “could” hurt this lizard’s food supply, which “could” impact the population—but we don’t know.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time this tiny species has been used as regulatory warfare against the Permian Basin and Texas energy. The Obama administration ultimately rejected a similar proposal in 2012, citing the lack of a threat to the species and its habitat at the time.
What has changed in the last ten years? According to the recent study cited in the proposal, the only thing that has changed is that the population of the Dunes Sagebrush Lizard has increased.
If Biden adopts this proposal, I will do everything in my power to protect Texas energy and Texas education. While it may be hard for Biden and the out-of-state environmentalists running his administration to understand, it isn’t hard for me.
People over lizards. Every single time.
Commissioner Dawn Buckingham, M.D. is a Texas physician and former state senator. She was sworn in as Texas’s first female Land Commissioner in January 2023.
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