By Kate Groetzinger
On Monday, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum issued a secretarial order calling for the review and possible revision of all national monuments and mineral withdrawals established by past U.S. presidents. The order has a 15 day deadline.
Secretarial Order No. 3418 implements President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14154, titled “Unleashing American Energy.” Among many other things, it directs Interior department staff “to review and, as appropriate, revise all withdrawn public lands, consistent with existing law, including 54 U.S.C. 320301 and 43 U.S.C. 1714.”
54 U.S.C. 320301 is the section of federal law that gives sitting U.S. presidents the power to designate federal lands as national monuments, thereby withdrawing them from future oil and gas leasing and mining claims. This law was established by the Antiquities Act of 1906. President Biden used the Antiquities Act to establish nine new national monuments.
43 U.S.C. 1714 is the section of federal law that gives sitting U.S. presidents the power to order mineral withdrawals that ban new mining and drilling, like those ordered by President Joe Biden for the Thompson Divide and Chaco Canyon regions.
The Center for Western Priorities issued the following statement from Executive Director Jennifer Rokala:
“President Trump and Secretary Burgum are headed down the wrong path with this monument review. The last time Trump attempted to shrink national monuments, his efforts were met with near-universal condemnation. They should stop now, before they upset millions of Westerners by illegally reducing or eliminating national monuments. Voters want national monuments protected in perpetuity, not opened for drilling and mining. Coming on the heels of the National Park Service hiring freeze, this move shows blatant disregard for Westerners and America’s public lands.”
In his first term, Trump attempted to illegally reduce the sizes of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments. This move was wildly unpopular at the time. In 2017, the Center for Western Priorities conducted two analyses that found a near-unanimous majority of Americans supported national monuments and disagreed with Trump’s move to shrink them.
Recent polling shows national monuments are widely supported by Western voters across the political spectrum. Colorado College’s 2024 State of the Rockies Conservation in the West poll found that 85 percent of Western voters support creating new national parks, national monuments, and national wildlife refuges and Tribal protected areas to protect historic sites or areas of outdoor recreation, and that 71 percent of Republican voters in the West are more likely to support a leader who “designated new national parks and national monuments.”
Polling released by the Grand Canyon Trust in January found that 65 percent of Utah voters support keeping the number and current size of existing national monuments, including 98 percent of Democrats, 82 percent of Independents, and 65 percent of Republicans. And that 80 percent of Arizona voters support keeping protections in place for Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni—Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument, including 68 percent of Republicans, 81 percent of Independents, and 91 percent of Democrats.
Kate Groetzinger is Communications Manager for the Center for Western Priorities.