Interior Proposes to Scrub Biden-Era Land Conservation Rule (1)

The Trump administration said Wednesday it wants to get rid of a Biden-era rule that elevated environmental conservation as a way to use public lands.

Scrubbing that rule would make it easier for energy developers to extract oil and gas from the 245 million acres of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management, furthering President Donald Trump’s domestic energy agenda.

Former President Joe Biden’s rule, finalized last year, put land conservation on the same level as uses like energy development, agricultural grazing, and timber harvesting. The administration at the time said it wanted to strike a balance between different uses, and that its approach helped public lands withstand threats such as climate change and invasive species.

But the Biden method “had the potential to block access to hundreds of thousands of acres of multiple-use land—preventing energy and mineral production, timber management, grazing and recreation across the West,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement.

Trump has set an aggressive goal of developing more domestic energy, not only to lower prices but also cut the nation’s reliance on potentially hostile nations.

“The most effective caretakers of our federal lands are those whose livelihoods rely on its well-being,” Burgum said. “Overturning this rule protects our American way of life and gives our communities a voice in the land that they depend on.”

The Biden rule was unlawful because Congress didn’t authorize environmental conservation as a use under the Federal Land and Policy Management Act, according to the Western Energy Alliance.

That statute “specifically defines ‘principal or major uses’ as limited to mineral exploration and production, livestock grazing, rights‐of‐way, fish and wildlife development, recreation, and timber,” said Melissa Simpson, the alliance’s president.

But environmentalists were quick to argue the proposed revocation is essentially a gift to industry that clashes with science and sustainability.

“This rule provided for healthy habitats and now it’s foolishly being yanked away in service of the ‘Drill, baby, drill’ agenda,” Vera Smith, national forests and public lands director at Defenders of Wildlife, said in a statement.

The nation’s public lands are home to more than 300 threatened and endangered species, as well as 2,460 other at-risk species that are unlisted but whose numbers are dropping, according to Defenders of Wildlife.

Similarly, Alison Flint, senior legal director at The Wilderness Society, said the Trump administration is “saying that public lands’ role in providing Americans the freedom to enjoy the outdoors, and conserve beloved places for future generation, is a second-class consideration.”

Jennifer Rokala, executive director of the Center for Western Priorities, noted that 92% of public comments supported the Biden-era public lands rule as it was being developed.

Most BLM lands are already open for energy development, Flint said.

Western states such as North Dakota, Idaho, and Montana are challenging the Biden rule in court.

The Bureau of Land Management will open a 60-day comment period once the proposed rule is published in the Federal Register.