Trump’s order may affect Colorado sites
It could call into question decades of national monument designations.
President Donald Trump will sign an executive order Wednesday instructing the Interior Department to review national monument designations his three predecessors have made over the past 21 years, according to administration officials and GOP lawmakers. The move could upend protections that previous presidents have put in place in Colorado, Utah and elsewhere across the country.
Presidents of both parties have invoked their executive authority under the 1906 Antiquities Act to provide safeguards for federal lands and waters. But some of these moves — including Barack Obama’s designation of the 1.35 million-acre Bears Ears National Monument in December and Bill Clinton’s 1996 declaration of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, both in Utah, have sparked fierce criticism from Republicans.
Members of Utah’s congressional delegation started lobbying Trump shortly after his November win to take unilateral action to undo the designation for Bears Ears, which they said should have been protected instead through legislation. While the White House has not yet indicated whether it would remove protections for the new monument, a White House official said in an email Monday that Trump was seeking to ensure the Antiquities
Act has not been abused at times.
“Past administrations have overused this power and designated large swaths of land well beyond the areas in need of protection,” said the official, who asked for anonymity in advance of the formal announcement. “The Antiquities Act Executive Order directs the Department of the Interior to review prior monument designations and suggest legislative changes or modifications to the monument proclamations.”
The Salt Lake City Tribune first reported details of the executive order on Sunday.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, RUtah, who traveled to Bears Ears last week to call yet again for a reversal of Obama’s designation, said in a statement that he was “grateful that the president has demonstrated his commitment to work with me on this vitally important issue and deliver real results for the Utahns most affected by these massive federal land grabs.”
“For years, I have fought every step of the way to ensure that our lands are managed by the Utahns that know them best and cherish them deeply,” Hatch said. “That's why I'm committed to rolling back the egregious abuse of the Antiquities Act to serve far-left special interests. As part of this commitment, I have leveraged all of my influence — from private meetings in the Oval Office in the President's first week in office to my latest trip to Bears Ears this week — to ensure that this issue is a priority on the president's agenda.”
A coalition of five tribes as well as environmentalists, archaeologists and outdoor industry groups lobbied Obama to put a large area in Utah’s San Juan County off-limits to development on the grounds that it boasted some of the nation's bestpreserved rock art and artifacts from ancient Pueblo civilization, which were being looted at times and damaged by motorized vehicle use and vandalism. At the time of last year's announcement, Navajo Nation president Russell Begaye told reporters: “We have always looked to Bears Ears as a place of refuge, as a place where we can gather herbs and medicinal plants, and a place of prayer and sacredness. These places — the rocks, the wind, the land — they are living, breathing things that deserve timely and lasting protection.”
Unlike the Bears Ears designation, which was done after then-Interior Secretary Sally Jewell held a lengthy public hearing and a GOP bill that would have protected part of the area stalled in the House, Clinton’s move to declare Grand Staircase-Escalante a national monument took most people by surprise. That sparked an outcry at the time, though tourism in the area has increased as a result.
Colorado has seen three national monuments created in the past 20 years: Browns Canyon, Canyons of the Ancients and Chimney Rock.
Any move by Trump to abolish a national monument designation could spark a serious legal battle. While Congress has wide latitude to change national monument designations, presidents rarely alter ones that are in place.
In a few instances, presidents have modified the size of monuments established by their predecessors: Woodrow Wilson cut nearly half the acreage of Mount Olympus National Monument, which Theodore Roosevelt had established.
But in 1938, the U.S. Attorney General wrote a formal opinion saying the Antiquities Act authorized a president to establish a monument but did not grant a president the right to abolish one.