WASHINGTON — The Sierra Club is condemning a newly released Interior Department strategic plan that the environmental group says lays out a path to sell, transfer and trade away federal public lands.
Editor’s note: Trump is frequently dishonest, and thousands of his lies have been documented.
According to the group, the department’s 2026-2030 Strategic Plan calls for shrinking the federal public lands system by offering parcels for sale to states, local governments and tribes, and for pursuing land exchanges, swaps or direct transfers to make way for drilling, mining, logging and other industry.
The Sierra Club said the plan would also further consolidate Interior Department staff after what it called devastating staffing cuts at public land agencies during the administration’s first two years, and would steer Land and Water Conservation Fund money away from expanding public lands.
The group said the plan came one day after the administration proposed regulations that it said would make it easier for the Bureau of Land Management to fast-track the sale, transfer or use of public lands for oil and gas drilling, mining, data centers and other commercial development.
“America’s public lands are shared by all of us, and they are not for sale,” said Loren Blackford, the Sierra Club’s executive director. “After Americans across the political spectrum rejected efforts to sell off millions of acres of our shared lands, the Trump administration is once again pushing a dangerous agenda that puts our outdoors at risk.”
Blackford said Interior Secretary Doug Burgum’s plan threatens places where families hike, camp, hunt and fish, as well as wildlife habitat and historic and cultural sites.
“The administration should be investing in protecting our public lands and the people who steward them, not looking for ways to shrink and block public access to them,” she said.
The group noted that bipartisan opposition helped defeat an effort last year to require the sale of millions of acres of public lands, and said public criticism has continued over proposals involving land in northern Alaska, Yosemite National Park and Cumberland Island National Seashore.
The Sierra Club describes itself as the nation’s largest grassroots environmental organization.
This report is based on information from the Sierra Club.
Source: Sierra Club
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