Map: Where Senate Republicans Want to Sell Your Public Lands

If a Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources proposal to sell hundreds of millions acres of public lands in the West goes through, it could cause irreparable damage to sensitive natural, historical, and cultural sites, warn groups from conservationists to hunters to indigenous communities.

As Andrew McKean explains in Outdoor Life, “The bill, in a section titled ‘Mandatory Disposal of Bureau of Land Management Land and National Forest Service System Land for Housing,’ requires the BLM and Forest Service to ‘select for disposal no less than 0.50 percent and not more than 0.75 percent’ of eligible land for sale. National parks, wildlife refuges, designated wilderness areas, national monuments, and historic sites would be exempt from sale.” A map created by The Wilderness Society illustrates the over 250 million acres eligible for sale under the proposal.

Although the bill purports to make more land available for affordable housing, critics point out that, while some strategic use of federal land could help, much of the land in question is far from existing cities and infrastructure and unsuitable for housing. The bill’s language includes an expansive “associated community needs” provision that could allow for “nearly any purpose,” according to an attorney who analyzed the text.”He says that could include AI data centers, ski areas, golf courses, or consolidation of large ranches.” Meanwhile, the administration has moved to open more public lands to mining, timber, and other extractive industries.

This isn’t a uniquely Western concern. “It doesn’t matter if you live in Bozeman or Baltimore, these lands belong to you,” said an unnamed legislative source who provided details for the story. Actions to defund, shrink, and eliminate national monuments and historic and cultural sites will harm ecosystems, erase key parts of the nation’s history, and make public lands less accessible to all Americans.