Legislator takes aim at feds and 'eco-terrorists'

The new administration of President Obama "has stolen the heritage of our people and this state," said state Rep. Mike Noel, R-Kanab, in an extended speech to his caucus members Thursday afternoon.

Ready for a new Sagebrush Rebellion? Some Utahns apparently are.

Members of the Utah House GOP caucus seemed ready to draw their handguns and ride off to the East, and take on those federalist Democrats who are trying to "take revenge" on Republican-dominated Utah.

A number of Noel's GOP colleagues agreed with Noel, a few giving the rancher and environmental consultant high-fives after his impassioned address.

The so-called Sagebrush Rebellion of the 1970s eventually fizzled. But a number of Westerners were sick of federal bureaucrats restricting their use of federal lands — lands that the federal government kept at statehood with the promise (never fulfilled) to sell off those lands for the benefit of the states' school children.

Noel said he plans to introduce a bill to make it a state felony — "eco-terrorism" — for anyone to try to stop "legal" development on federal or state lands. In particular, he singled out Tim DeChristopher, who bought up recent oil drilling leases at a public auction to keep them away from oil companies.

This week the Obama administration voided those leases, an act, said Noel, that will cost Utah up to $30 million a year in lost royalties.

"That University of Utah student (DeChristopher) committed a felony, in my opinion," said Noel. "And I hope to make a felony out of it" through legislation.

Noel said stopping a legal oil lease is no different than "burning down a man's cattle operation — eco-terrorism." DeChristopher "took millions of dollars away from us, and he's laughing at us. It's not right. It's not fair."

DeChristopher said he's not an eco-terrorist. "What I did was non-destructive. And I don't believe ultimately it will have any negative effect on Utah. Just the opposite. Our real energy development in Southern Utah is sustainable energy, wind, solar and geothermal. They will bring more jobs than oil, and jobs that will be long lasting, beyond when the oil runs out."

DeChristopher added that a judge and the new secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, recognize that the Bureau of Land Management didn't follow federal law in "rushing" to bid the oil leases just before former President George W. Bush left office.