Utah politicians announced a lawsuit Wednesday challenging the Biden administration s designation of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments.
Utah sued the federal government over the sizes of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments. Republican politicians say President Joe Biden violated the Antiquities Act after President Donald Trump reduced the monuments.
Busiest airport in Wyoming and only major commercial one located inside a crown jewel national park, Jackson Hole Airport has transformed its setting and the valley
, which President Donald Trump reduced by 2 million acres in 2017. The announcement rekindled tensions in Utah, where national monument designations have been used to add protections to federal public lands for more than 100 years, often over the objections of state leaders.
In order to better understand the history and use of the Antiquities Act, we caught up with David Gessner, author of the new book “
,” by email to help put the current debate into a historical context.
The Salt Lake Tribune: Monument designations have a long history in the Southwest. In fact, the very law that allows presidents to create national monuments on federal public land the Antiquities Act of 1906 originated because of widespread looting of Southwestern cultural sites around the turn of the 20th century. How did the act become law?