Future of Public Lands Looks Litigious Under Trump

According to an article from Bloomberg, environmental groups are preparing for “copious litigation” in the coming years to hold the line against a second Trump administration’s efforts to open up federal land for fossil fuels and other development. “Though President-elect Donald Trump disavowed the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, his new administration is expected to take cues from its approach to public lands and natural resources development, and he repeatedly said on the campaign trail that he’d promote oil drilling,” writes reporter Bobby Magill.

The chapter of Project 2025 pertaining to federal lands was written by a former Bureau of Land Management official who served under the first Trump administration and calls for “a rapid ramp-up of oil, natural gas, and coal production,” including in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which the Biden administration moved to restrict last week.

While it remains unclear how much the Trump administration will rely on Project 2025, the document represents a “is a ‘wish list’ for the oil and gas and mining industries and private developers,” Melinda Taylor, senior lecturer at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law told Bloomberg. The article says, “Environmental attorneys and legal experts say they’ll be watching how the new administration approaches calls for the abolishment of national monuments, Utah’s push to take over public lands from the federal government, and its adherence to federal law.”