Biden to restore 2 Utah national monuments cut by Trump
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — President Joe Biden will restore two sprawling national monuments in Utah that have been at the center of a long-running public lands tug-of-war between presidential administrations, the state’s governor said Thursday.
Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, released a statement expressing disappointment in Biden's decision to restore Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante monuments, which were downsized significantly under President Donald Trump. Cox's office said Interior Secretary Deb Haaland informed the governor of Biden’s decision.
The monuments cover vast expanses of southern Utah where red rocks reveal petroglyphs and cliff dwellings and distinctive twin buttes bulge from a grassy valley. The Trump administration had cut Bears Ears, on lands considered sacred to Native American tribes, by 85% and slashed Grand Staircase-Escalante by nearly half. Both monuments were created by Democratic presidents.
The White House and the U.S. Interior Department declined to comment Thursday, but a Democratic aide said Biden's order will also restore protections to a marine conservation area off the New England coast.
Trump had also made a rule change to allow commercial fishing at the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts National Monument, in the Atlantic Ocean. The move was heralded by fishing groups, but environmentalists pushed Biden and Haaland to restore the marine monument's protections.
Protecting it would “safeguard this invaluable area for the fragile species that call it home” and demonstrate the administration’s commitment to science, said Jen Felt, ocean campaign director for the Conservation Law Foundation.
Arizona Rep. Raul Grijalva, a Democrat and chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, praised the Biden administration in a statement,...
