Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts (R) over the past months has been spearheading a relentless fight against Biden’s Executive Order 14008, with its infamous Section 216 “30×30” decree, at both the national and state levels. A self-professed “climate skeptic,” in February Ricketts helped organize 17 state governors to sign a letter warning President Biden to “reverse course” on his 30×30 land grab. Ricketts has been holding town hall meetings all over his state, encouraging local leaders to pass resolutions to block its implementation. To date, over 50 of Nebraska’s 93 counties have done so. In June, Ricketts signed an executive order against EO 14008 which he details in an Aug. 2 statement posted on the governor’s website. Given that 97% of land in Nebraska is privately owned, taking 30% out of production he warns would “devastate food production, our rural communities and our state’s overall economy.”
Governor Ricketts ends his statement with an ominous warning that the “environmental activists won’t be satisfied with just 30%.” He refers to a group called Nature Needs Half, formed in 2009 for the purpose of lobbying to place 50% of the Earth into conservatorship. He cites the 2016 book by naturalist E.O. Wilson entitled “Half-Earth” arguing for half of the Earth to be off limits for humans—"50×50.” Ricketts then quotes Biden’s Secretary of Commerce, Gina Raimondo, who says “Thirty percent isn’t the end. Thirty percent is the beginning. It’s setting a very strong foundation and we hope will build the momentum for longer-term conservation.”
The weakness in Ricketts’ statement is that he so far fails to identify the green financial mafia in the City of London and Wall Street who are using the Biden administration along with the environmental extremists to carry out their Malthusian war of extermination against the human race. A “Great Leap Backward” pamphlet has been provided to the Governor’s Mansion, and to many lawmakers in Nebraska and throughout the Central States. The Aug. 2 governor’s statement: https://governor.nebraska.gov/press/taking-action-stop-30-x-30
This coming week, the R-CALF national convention in Rapid City, South Dakota, will have a session against the green 30×30 land grab, addressed by Margaret Byfield, the head of the American Stewards of Liberty group, headquartered in Texas, which is campaigning for counties and groups to pass resolutions against Executive Order 14008. Her topic, “Peeling Back the Layers of Biden’s 30×30 Land Grab,” may focus more narrowly on how the Executive Order subverts property rights, which it does, but it does much more. R-CALF has the largest membership of independent livestock producers in the U.S. Another of its convention presentations will expose the World Wildlife Fund, cartels and others behind the Green Deal, presented by Wyoming rancher and attorney Tracy Hunt. It is titled, “The Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef: They’re Coming for You and Your Ranch.”
At the July Schiller Institute International Conference, “There Is No ‘Climate Emergency,’” Kansas farmer activist Angel Cushing lambasted the whole range of land lock-ups and and its intended impact to cut food production. She said that the old “Bison Commons” crazy idea is now live, to replace food production on the High Plains with no-economic-activity, non-human “nature preserves.” The biggest such project in the U.S. is centered in Montana, for the “American Prairie Reserve,” which backers intend to create by Federal and private conservation easements, paid for by billionaire greenie types, to turn over 3 million acres to buffalo and wilderness.
Governor Ricketts singles out the easements mechanism in his Aug. 2 statement. In a productive society, easements are useful for where to site power lines, and other public-use necessary infrastructure. But, Rickett’s blasts the green “conservation easements” schemes. A conservation easement is created when a landowner enters into a contract with the federal government or a private “land trust” to restrict development on land for nominally conservation purposes—nature minus humans. Generally, the landowner maintains ownership while a government agency or land trust manages the property.
There are 1,300 private conservation land trusts currently operating in the U.S. managing 56 million acres of property. Very generous tax breaks are being offered by the IRS as an enticement for struggling ranchers and farmers to sign these contracts. Another incentive is that conservation easements lower land value significantly (59% on average in Nebraska) which means lower property taxes. The problem according to Ricketts is that this forces localities to raise other taxes to make up for revenue shortfalls. He warns that in Nebraska, unless stated otherwise, a conservation easement contract is perpetual, even if the property is sold or gifted to heirs. “Once the contract is signed, future generations cannot go back and reconsider whether land should remain under restriction.” states the Governor.
Landowners can also outright sell their property to a land trust or the federal government. Four agencies, Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service and Forest Service using money authorized by Congress through the Land Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) can purchase land for conservation easements. The federal government is exempt from paying any state or local property tax at all. In lieu of tax however, according to Ricketts, the Department of the Interior generally pays a pathetic $2.50 per acre to the state. The federal government currently owns approximately 640 million acres of land in the United States, including land in Alaska.
