Lawmakers Removed a 500,000-Acre Public Lands Sell-Off from the President’s Budget Bill

Republican House leadership removed a measure that would have sold as much as 500,000 acres of federal land from the budget reconciliation bill after several members of their party from western states threatened to pull support.

Introduced late last month by Representatives Mark Amodei (R-NV) and Celeste Maloy (R-UT), the amendment to the budget bill would have put up for sale 11,000 acres of Bureau of Land Management and US Forest Service land in Utah and at least 500,000 acres  in Nevada for the stated purpose of expanding housing.

While the amendment got approval from the House Natural Resources Committee, it found a staunch opponent in Montana Rep. Ryan Zinke who, along with six other House Republicans and seven Democrats, formed the House Public Lands Caucus to oppose the sale. Zinke—who told Outside in a recent interview that he regards selling off public lands to get out of debt as “folly”—said he would not vote for the budget bill if House leadership didn’t strike the measure. On Tuesday night, the House Rules Committee did indeed remove it through a “manager’s amendment.”

“This was my San Juan Hill; I do not support the widespread sale or transfer of public lands,” Zinke wrote on Facebook. “Once the land is sold, we will never get it back. God isn’t creating more land. Public access, sportsmanship, grazing, tourism… our entire Montanan way of life is connected to our public lands.”

Jessica Turner, president of the Outdoor Recreation Roundtable, celebrated the decision and praised Zinke and Public Lands Caucus co-founder Rep. Gabe Vasquez (D-NM) for blocking the sale.

“Congress avoided setting a dangerous precedent that lands can be sold anytime the U.S. Treasury needs a budget ‘pay-for’ and threatening outdoor recreation businesses and rural communities alike that need certainty, access, and long-term infrastructure,” Turner wrote in an emailed statement.

But even as some public lands advocates celebrated the victory, others expressed alarm about some of the other measures contained in the budget bill, which, among other things, would cut resourcing for the National Park Service, authorize mining near Minnesota’s Boundary Waters, and increase oil and gas drilling on public lands.

“This bill also contains the most dangerous attack on public lands in a generation,” Christy Goldfuss, executive director of the Natural Resources Defense Council, wrote in an emailed press release. “It guts environmental safeguards, shuts out the public from decision making, and turns over millions of acres to drillers, miners, and loggers. It even would allow them to pay to get their project rubber stamped.”

The budget, formally titled “The One Big, Beautiful Bill Act,” passed the House in an overnight session on Wednesday; it now goes to the Senate, where most political observers expect it to face a tougher fight.