On May 6, House Republicans unleashed a new, targeted attack on public lands in Utah. At the eleventh hour, and at the end of a day-long hearing, Representatives Mark Amodei (R-NV-2) and Celeste Maloy (R-UT-2) introduced an amendment to a bill in the House Natural Resources Committee that would sell off over 11,000 acres of Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lands in Utah and nearly 500,000 acres in Nevada. This backdoor maneuver bypassed standard legislative procedures, allowed no meaningful debate, and was blatantly timed to evade public scrutiny. The amendment passed and the Committee ultimately voted in favor of the entire bill along party lines. 

The bill and amendment are now part of a larger budget plan which Republicans hope to pass by Memorial Day. Assuming it passes the House, the bill heads to the Senate, where anti-public-lands champion Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) is certain to try and leave his own mark on the legislation. Under this reckless budget plan, proceeds from public land sales will go to the U.S. Treasury to fund tax cuts for billionaires.

No Public Benefit

While Rep. Maloy has been claiming that this public land sell-off will be for things like affordable housing and infrastructure, nothing in the legislation requires the parcels sold off in this bill to be used for public purposes and there are no limitations on how the lands can be used once sold. In other words, the land could be developed for golf courses, luxury resorts, strip malls, private vacation homes, or simply flipped for sale again. Nothing is off the table. 

Importantly, despite that Rep. Maloy has had maps of the parcels she intends to sell off since at least March, she never bothered to provide the public, including her constituents, any opportunity to participate in the process of identifying these parcels, let alone time to understand the long-term effect of selling off these public lands.

Places at Risk 

Because nothing is too special to sell off to the highest bidder, the lands Rep. Maloy intends to sell off include stunning parcels of public land–many of which have been previously protected. These include:

• parcels within Beaver Dam Wash and Red Cliffs National Conservation Areas—areas Congress designated to conserve and protect spectacular natural and cultural resources. 
• parcels within the Santa Clara River Reserve, which protects open space and has many recreational opportunities. 
• parcels within the Santa Clara/Gunlock and Red Bluff Areas of Critical Environmental Concern, as well as land within the Red Mountain Wilderness. 
• several parcels contiguous to Zion National Park, one of the most visited national parks in the nation and an economic engine for Washington County. The tracts proposed for sale include a 300-acre mesa outside the small town of Rockville, as well as tracts at popular Zion-area trailheads. 
• Other parcels cut though habitat for the desert tortoise, a species listed as Threatened under the Endangered Species Act, as well as habitat for mule deer and desert bighorn sheep.

This reckless attempt to sell public lands through a legislative shortcut like budget reconciliation ensures that there will be no public input and no environmental review. These lands have not been appraised or surveyed for cultural sites, endangered species, or other important values. Rep. Maloy’s amendment threatens public access, undermines responsible land management, and betrays the public’s trust. 

This amendment is only the start of the push by the current administration, extractive industry, and private developers to sell off public lands across the nation. But such moves are deeply unpopular. Polling has repeatedly shown that the public—especially Westerners—strongly believe in keeping public lands in public hands and, across partisan lines, reject any efforts that would lead to the sale of these shared and cherished lands. The House must reject this misguided and wildly unpopular notion. And we must remain vigilant about these continued threats to recklessly sell off public lands.