ShareThisThursday, November 16, 2006
Richard Pombo went to Congress in 1992 with the aim of gutting the Endangered Species Act and other environmental legislation that we take for granted today _ the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Marine Mammal Protection Act, Estuary Protection Act, Coastal Zone Act and more. But his attempts to roll back this legacy of conservation _ much of it crafted by Republicans _ finally caught up to him. After seven terms in office, he lost 53 percent to 47 percent. He was the first committee chairman in the last five election cycles to lose a race.
As Pombo himself realized, the environment was the issue. The Bee reported after the election that Pombo noted that his difficulties "had little to do with Iraq or Abranoff, ... and more to do with concerted efforts of environmental groups and other critics who targeted his race."
When virtually everyone else thought Pombo was unbeatable, including the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, environmental groups took on Pombo, eventually spending $1.3 million and providing hundreds of volunteers.
What the environmentalists realized was that even though Republicans edged Democrats in voter registrations (44 percent to 37 percent), Pombo faced bipartisan rejection of his anti-environmental agenda in a district where the fertile San Joaquin Valley meets the East Bay. His district is growing rapidly. Many of these residents are priced out of the Bay Area real estate market. Whether Republicans or Democrats or independents, these folks believe that protection of the environment is essential to quality of life.
Environmentalists also realized that where Pombo had been able to run under the radar in the past, everything changed when he became chairman of the House Committee on Resources in 2003. As chairman, Pombo floated ideas for selling off national parks, commercializing public lands and drilling for oil and gas off California's coastal areas and in pristine wilderness areas such as Alaska. One day in 2005 Pombo brought massive changes to the Endangered Species Act to his Resources Committee, bypassing the normal process of an initial review before a subcommittee. The next day the committee voted on it. A week later it passed on the House floor. Pombo showed he could ram legislation through with little scrutiny.
In the Senate, however, Pombo's bill went nowhere. But his actions mobilized people across the country who care about environmental issues.
Now that the election is over, Republicans in Congress have to realize politicians who overreach on environmental issues will pay a price, as Pombo did. Whether they've actually gotten that message will show in what happens in the lame-duck session of Congress between now and January. A Pombo bill on offshore oil and gas drilling already was going nowhere in the Senate. Will he and his Republican colleagues attempt to negotiate a compromise with the Senate version? Or will they attempt to ram Pombo's version through? The approach Republicans take on the offshore drilling issue will tell voters whether they've gotten the message of the Pombo defeat: Voters do pay attention to environmental issues and they vote against anti-environmental extremism.
