Mountain Pact February 2026 Federal Public Lands (and a Climate) Updates and Way to Take Action

[Anna Peterson]

Hi all,

See below for our February updates and ways to take action (in green). Note that monthly conservation updates go out at the end of the month - you can see past updates here); sign up for those via our website. 

I know a lot of you are heading to NACo soon. Please let me know if we can support your efforts there in any way. 

1. Comment on Endangerment Findings news? I've gotten requests from reporters for quotes and responses to today's news that the Trump Administration Erases the Government’s Power to Fight Climate Change.

Please let me know if you have a comment. This is an opportunity to highlight the terrible drought we are experiencing and other impacts our western communities are experiencing from climate change - let me know if you are interested in doing an op-ed or commenting on this. 

2. Congressional Meetings: We're helping to pull together some zooms with congressional offices (especially in AZ, CA, CO, ID, and MT) this spring and summer - let me know if you might be interested in participating in these.  A huge thank you to six California county supervisors and former mayors/council members for participating in our recent meeting with Rep. Kiley. 

3. Opposition to Steve Pearce to Lead the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Nomination: Former New Mexico Congressman Stevan Pearce, is President Trump’s pick to lead the Bureau of Land Management. Pearce is on the record as a strident opponent of Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument in New Mexico’s Doña Ana County. Additionally, his record in Congress, including his public support for selling off America’s public lands, his conflicts of interest with the oil and gas industry, and his efforts to undermine national monuments and the Antiquities Act, demonstrates that he is the wrong candidate to lead this complex multiple-use agency. More information on why we are opposing his nomination is below (let me know if I can get you more details). His senate hearing is expected to happen the week of February 23. 

We'll be sending out our media release again as an In Case You Missed It (ICYMI) ahead of his hearing and would like to add more quotes - let me know if you'd like to include a quote opposing his nomination in that outreach.

Some Topline Talking Points - Opposition to Steve Pearce to Run the Bureau of Land Management

• Pearce has a long track record of supporting efforts to give away or sell off our public lands.
• We can’t afford to have a person with Pearce’s record in charge of the 245 million acres of public lands across the country.
• If Pearce is confirmed as director of the BLM he will have broad authority and power to dispose of public lands, or hand over control to those who would ultimately privatize them.   
• BLM lands are important to our constituents and having a good partner in charge of the BLM is critical for management of public lands in and around our communities.

4. Threat to Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument  -Potential Use of the Congressional Review Act on the Resource Management Plan - On Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026, at the request of Utah Representative Celeste Maloy (R-UT-02), the Government Accountability Office (GAO) issued a decision determining that the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument Resource Management plan, which was finalized in January 2025, is a rule subject to the Congressional Review Act (CRA): "...We conclude that the Grand Staircase RMP is a rule for purposes of CRA.”

We anticipate Utah’s federal delegation (Senators Lee & Curtis, Representatives Owens, Moore, Maloy, and Kennedy) to introduce a bill called a “resolution of disapproval” in the Senate and House under the Congressional Review Act seeking to overturn the current Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument Resource Management Plan soon. If both chambers of Congress pass the resolution and the President signs it, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) will be barred from issuing another plan that is “substantially the same” in the future.  The effect will be to muzzle the voices of community leaders who worked for more than two years with the federal government to create this blueprint for the monument.  

This will be a major escalation of CRA use, and the first attempt ever to use this blunt legislative tool to attack a national monument. 

This action threatens to upend public land protection as we know it. Though this Congress is the first to use the CRA to overturn BLM resource management plans, using it to eliminate a national monument management plan goes much further: resource management plans cover multiple-use lands, but national monuments are not multiple-use lands and were specifically designated to elevate conservation over extraction and other multiple uses, like recreation access and grazing.

Abolishing the resource management plan through congressional action does not change the monument's boundaries or the governing proclamation establishing it, but it poses a serious threat to all of our national monuments and their respective management plans.

• National monuments are overwhelmingly popular. Three in four Utah voters, including a majority of Republicans, want to keep Grand Staircase-Escalante as a national monument.
• The Utah delegation is trying to get around the will of the American people by using an arcane law to weaken protections for our most beloved lands at the behest of extractive industries. This is another piece of the State of Utah’s tireless work to end the nation’s system of federal public lands.
• Monument management plans set expectations for how the land will be managed for wildlife, outdoor access, dark night skies and other uses. This move threatens that certainty.
• If Congress uses the CRA to invalidate the resource management plan they will recklessly - and needlessly – cause confusion for everyone who visits or uses these lands.
• Tribal Nations have a vested interest in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument - The Grand Staircase-Escalante Inter-Tribal Coalition consists of six Tribes: Hopi Tribe, Navajo Nation, Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, Zuni Tribe, Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah, and Kaibab Band of Paiute Indians.

We have a statement and media release ready should this move forward. Let me know if you'd like to include a quote opposing this action in our release.  

5. Firings and Funding Reductions - Direct Impacts to our Public Lands? Please consider filling out this short survey on the direct impact you are seeing from reduced federal funding and staffing cuts. We may do a report or compilation of these specific impacts this spring/summer. 

6. More Pro Public Lands Resolutions: We are continuing to track attempts to sell off our public lands. If you haven't already, please consider joining the nearly 70 communities across the west who have passed resolutions, sent letters to their federal delegation, or issued proclamations affirming their commitment to defending our nation’s most treasured natural spaces. We will likely have an updated resolution template in the next month or so, but in the meantime, let me know if this is of interest to you!

7. Social Posts and Videos: Social Posts & Videos: If possible, we'd love to get the word out even on social media around these issues. 

• We'd love to pull together a video with local elected officials showing support for our public lands - could you take one minute to film yourself saying "County/City/Town Name love our public lands and they are not for sale!;" or read a recent quote.  
• If you are willing to post, and/or send your short videos to me (or link to your social post), or add them to this google folder. I'll compile them - it would be amazing to have many from all over the west! 
• Here is a long script too: 
• Hi, my name is ___________, and I represent [COMMUNITY NAME]. I’m here at [LANDSCAPE], where I like to [WHAT]. The great thing about this place is it is open and accessible to everyone. Public lands like this are important to our community. They benefit our economy and give people a place to explore and play.

• But anti-public lands politicians are attacking our public lands. They’re taking actions that could open up national monuments to oil and gas drilling; slashing budgets and jobs at the public land agencies; and working to authorize the sale of these irreplaceable landscapes to the highest bidder.

  Places like [LANDSCAPE] are a big part of what makes our community so special. That’s why I am calling for an end to the attacks on public lands so we can keep these amazing places open, healthy, and accessible for generations to come.

8. Opinion Editorials: We'd like to continue to show support for our public lands in the media. Please let me know if you are interested in doing an opinion piece.

9. Contact Information: Let me know if you have been termed out and please connect me with new folks on your commission/board/council who may be interested in what we do. 

Thank you!

Anna

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ANNA PETERSON

Executive Director | The Mountain Pact 

Durango, Colorado | (612) 735-2402 | anna@themountainpact.org

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Founded in 2014, The Mountain Pact educates, empowers, and mobilizes local elected officials in over 100 Western mountain communities with outdoor recreation based economies to speak with a collective voice on federal climate, public lands, and outdoor recreation policy.