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The Interior department is delivering on an oil industry wish list submitted to the agency earlier this year. A lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute sent the list to three high-level Trump administration officials in April, noting that her organization drafted it after meeting with President Donald Trump and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum.
Public Domain's Hana Beach and Jimmy Tobias obtained the wish list through a Freedom of Information Act request, and found that of the 40 specific policy changes that API asked for, the Trump administration has already moved to fulfill about half of them.
The changes include removing protections for migratory birds killed by the oil industry; opening pristine wildlife habitat in Alaska to drilling; and rescinding a Biden-era rule that aimed to balance conservation and extraction on public lands.
On Thursday, the Bureau of Land Management announced four final rules to implement oil and gas provisions in the reconciliation bill passed by Congress, with almost no opportunity for the public to weigh in on how the agency implements the law. For two of the rules, BLM is skipping a public comment period entirely; the other two rules will be final after just a 30 day public comment period.
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As heat and drought intensify, ranchers in the Southwest are the ones with skin in the game. They have serious motivations to safeguard the health of the lands that sustain their families, and most of them are also lifelong students of the ranching trade, eager to adapt and innovate.”
