Richard Pombo: Enemy of the Earth

Richard Pombo makes Number 7 on Rolling Stone Magazine's list of the 10 worst Congressmen!

No member of Congress has worked harder to savage America's natural resources than Pombo, a Stetson-wearing cattleman who ran for office after a nature trail was slated to run through his family's 500-acre ranch. As chairman of the House Resources Committee, Pombo has waged a career-long campaign to abolish the Endangered Species Act, which he accuses of putting 'rats and shellfish' before people. Last year he almost succeeded: His comically titled 'Threatened and Endangered Species Recovery Act' would have phased out all protection for threatened wildlife by 2015. Pombo has also won passage of bills to eliminate habitat protections on 150 million acres of wilderness and to lift a quarter-century moratorium on offshore oil drilling.

'Dick Pombo is the most dangerous member of the House,' says Carl Pope of the Sierra Club. 'There's no one who represents the threat to our public lands that he does.'

But Pombo doesn't let his environmental attacks get in the way of his own profit: He raked in $35,000 from clients of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, and paid his own wife and brother $357,000 for dubious campaign services. That's a quarter of every dollar raised by his political action committee -- known, aptly enough, as Rich PAC.