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Senate committee member presses bureau on foreign and automated public comments
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Summary
At a Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources hearing, an unnamed senator asked whether public comments can be submitted by foreign actors or automated systems and whether the bureau can and should weight comments from local residents more heavily; a bureau official said commenters generally must identify themselves and that staff can distinguish bots from local commenters, a point the senator disputed.
An unnamed senator pressed an unidentified bureau official at a Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources hearing about whether public comments can be submitted by foreign actors or automated systems and whether comments from local residents should be given greater weight.
The senator opened the exchange by saying he had heard concerns at the Wyoming Stockgrowers Summer Convention in Douglas about "the process by which your bureau considers public comments," and asked, "Does the bureau require individuals who submit public comments to identify who they are and where they are from?" The bureau official replied, "Senator, I believe that is the case." The official also referenced permitting and production, saying it is not "sabotage to be at record production highs for oil, and to issue 11,000 APD."
The senator then asked whether people "from a country like China or Russia or a computer" are allowed to submit comments. The exchange acknowledged that such submissions can be made. The senator asked directly, "So they can the bureau even determine then whether a comment has submitted by a human or by a machine?" and stated, verbatim, "The the answer is no. You can't." The bureau official, however, asserted the agency reviews comments "very thoroughly" and said, "I think that we can tell when it's a bot and when it's a Russian and when it's when it's an actual Idaho," citing what staff received "from the lava project" as an example.
The senator pressed the point of democratic weight, arguing that "the bureau [should] give the most weight to comments from the people and the communities who actually live ... most affected by the proposals." The bureau official rejected a characterization that opponents were relying on bots, saying, "I don't think that's true. We we read the comments very thoroughly." The official also said staff can tell origins in at least some cases.
The exchange ended with the senator restating his concern that comment tallies appeared to treat long-standing local residents and submissions he described as coming from "communist China" on equal footing. The transcript records the back-and-forth but does not show any formal action, vote, or a conclusive resolution of how the bureau will weight or verify comment origins.
Clarifying details recorded in the hearing: the bureau official referenced issuance of "11,000 APD" during the discussion; the transcript does not define "APD." The official also referenced "the lava project" without further explanation in the record. The hearing transcript does not provide the names of the senator or the bureau official; both speakers are identified only by role in the transcript.
The committee did not take a vote during this exchange, and the transcript ends with the senator thanking the chairman.
