Federal Government Denies Filming Permission To "Pawn Star" Rick Harrison Blaming Sequester

Rick Harrison, one of the stars of the History Channel’s “Pawn Stars” program, had an idea for a show about dune buggies and applied to the federal government to film it since parts of it would take place on federal land.

Unfortunately, the federal government denied permission blaming sequester spending reductions, which prompted Harrison to call in to Mark Levin’s show to complain about it:

From PJ Tatler:

Pawn Stars chief Rick Harrison called into the Mark Levin Show Friday night. He told Levin that he had come up with new reality show about dune buggiers in southern California, and approached federal authorities about getting permission to film, as the dune buggiers do their thing on federal land.

The federal government, Harrison says, denied permission and blamed the sequester. Harrison says the show would not have cost the federal government anything. In fact, it would have employed over 100 people.

This is getting a little ridiculous. Here in North Dakota we’re dealing with shut down of the Painted Canyon overlook area in the badlands, one of the most scenic parts of the state. Running the overlook costs about $40,000/year.

Let’s be clear, for all the furor over the sequester spending reductions, they really don’t amount to much as this chart from Daniel Mitchell shows:

Yet we are to believe that these sequester spending reductions (which aren’t enough to offset overall growth in federal spending, as you can see) are so severe that Rick Harrison can’t film on federal property at no cost to the federal government, and the National Park Service can’t run an overlook in North Dakota that has been in operation since back when the federal budget was about half what it is now.