Trump’s Pick Sgamma Withdraws as Land Management Nominee (1)

Kathleen Sgamma, president of the Western Energy Alliance, has withdrawn as President Donald Trump’s nominee for Bureau of Land Management director, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) said Thursday.

Sgamma was scheduled to testify at her confirmation hearing Thursday morning, but did not appear. Lee, chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, did not comment about her withdrawal.

Sgamma and the White House didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment. WEA declined to comment.

On Thursday, David Bernhardt, who served as Interior secretary during the first Trump administration, highlighted an April 8 post on X about Sgamma’s Jan. 7, 2021, statement to WEA members condemning the Capitol riots the previous day in Washington.

Sgamma at the time called the riots “shocking” and said she was “disgusted” that such violence is excused by many politicians.

“Individuals who know their views don’t align with the president, and yet seek political appointments hoping such divergence will not be noticed cause needless harm and conflict, hindering the president’s agenda,” Bernhardt said in his X post. “Sad. Self-inflicted.”

Sgamma’s nomination was part of Trump’s agenda to expand fossil fuels development on federal land nationwide. The BLM manages more than 240 million acres of federal land, mainly in the West, and manages all federally-owned oil, gas, and minerals nationwide.

Sgamma has long been an outspoken advocate for oil and gas drilling on federal land, and WEA under her leadership prolifically litigated the Biden administration’s public lands conservation efforts, including its failure to hold quarterly oil and gas lease sales.

The Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental group, said Sgamma’s withdrawal is good news for public lands.

“There’s no doubt that Trump’s next nominee will also be a poisonous threat to our wildlife and wild places, but this speedbump gives senators a chance to ponder whether they really want to feed America’s public lands and monuments into the snapping jaws of the fracking and mining industries,” Taylor McKinnon, the center’s Southwest director, said in a statement.