Colorado and national environmental groups today were sharply critical of congressional plans to accelerate a White House decision on the controversial Keystone XL pipeline as part of a deal to extend payroll tax relief and unemployment benefits.
Revelations Monday that Houston-based Anadarko may be sitting on up to a billion barrels of oil along Colorado’s Front Range immediately raised concerns about the environmental impacts of hydraulic fracturing in an area of increased residential growth in recent years.
Still more than a year from Election Day, Colorado Fourth District Republican Congressman Cory Gardner today reported to the Federal Election Commission that he hauled down a whopping $371,312 over the last three months. That tops his second-quarter take by more than $70,000 to bring his total this year to $896,176. Roughly 12 percent of Gardner’s donations this quarter came from oil and gas companies or individuals and organizations tied to the oil and gas industry.
Freshman Republican Congressman Cory Gardner weathered a drawn out if ultimately not-close Tea Party caucus battle last year and rode the Republican wave to victory over Democrat Betsy Markey.* Less than a year later, he’s again navigating the increasingly rocky electoral waters of Colorado’s sprawling Fourth District.
Freshman U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner pulled in more campaign contributions than any other congressional candidate in the second quarter of the year, according to the Greeley Tribune, with more than 10 percent of the funds coming from mining, oil and gas companies. The Republican lawmaker in the mineral-rich 4th Congressional District of northeastern Colorado has been a consistent proponent of more domestic drilling and mining.
The U.S. House is expected to vote this week, perhaps today, on a package of cuts to environmental programs that some Coloradans find simply unacceptable. Among the cuts, spending on climate change programs would be cut by more than $80 million or 22 percent. Money for land acquisition would drop by almost a quarter of a billion dollars or nearly 80 percent.
U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., and the rest of the Colorado’s majority Republican congressional delegation are all wet for voting along with the GOP-controlled House to pass the Clean Water Cooperative Federalism Act by a margin of 239-184 on Wednesday, according to the bill’s many outraged opponents.
Colorado conservation groups will rally on the sidewalk in front of U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner’s office in Fort Collins on Friday to protest the Republican congressman’s ongoing legislative campaign to rein in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and keep the federal agency from regulating greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.
U.S. Sen. Mark Udall announced Wednesday that he introduced “Good Samaritan” legislation that would provide legal protection for non-profit and other groups who would cleanup water contamination issuing from abandoned mines across Colorado.
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