During the Biden administration, American Stewards published numerous articles and warnings about how land management plans of federal agencies were being used to destroy private property and reduce multiple uses on the federal lands. The federal government prioritized “conservation” as the “controlling” use.
Last week with the federal government shut down, members of Congress were busy passing Congressional Review Act (CRA) Joint Resolutions of Disapproval to overturn several of Biden-era Bureau of Land Management Resource Management Plans (RMPs).
North Dakota’s congressional delegation – Congresswoman Julie Fedorchak and Senators Kevin Cramer and John Hoeven – introduced a CRA to overturn Biden’s BLM rule that shut down access to four million acres, nearly 99 percent of federal coal mining acreage, and blocked 213,000 acres (44 percent) of oil and gas production in the state.
On the same day, October 8th, Montana U.S. Senators Steve Daines and Tim Sheehy, as well as Representatives Troy Downing and Ryan Zinke introduced another CRA joint resolution to overturn Biden’s Miles City Resource Management Plan Amendment (RMPA) that made 2,000,000 acres unavailable for coal leasing causing the loss of $4.32 billion in future revenue to the Montana State land trust beneficiaries.
The CRAs are now headed to the President’s desk for his signature.
The Biden administration’s Bureau of Land Management added “conservation” on the list of “Multiple uses” and prioritized it over oil, gas, coal, grazers, and recreationists’ uses making them essentially “nonuses.”
These Biden rulings all prevented the mining, drilling for oil and gas, and the timber harvesting of millions of acres causing the loss of vital revenue to the states and local communities, as well as tremendous economic security for our nation.
