DENVER — The U.S. House of Representatives should reject legislation this week that would reverse efforts to conserve iconic lands and wildlife in Alaska and undermine Bureau of Land Management (BLM) efforts to restore and mitigate degraded federal lands and waters. House bill 6285 would reinstate cancelled oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and expand opportunities to drill in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. This would endanger polar bears, porcupine caribou, muskox, and hundreds of species of migratory birds while also jeopardizing subsistence hunting for Indigenous communities. House bill 3397 would nullify the BLM’s Public Lands Rule, which is designed to give the agency new tools to restore degraded public lands and waters and puts conservation on par with other uses in Congress’s multiple use mandate.

“At a time when wildlife and our public lands are facing unprecedented challenges from wildfire, drought, invasive species, and industrial development, the proposed bills will only exacerbate these problems. Prioritizing resource extraction in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other parts of northern Alaska threatens the wildlife and Indigenous communities that depend on these lands for survival. Nullifying the Public Lands Rule limits the ability of land managers to restore important habitat for fish, wildlife, livestock, and people,” said David Willms, associate vice president for public lands at the National Wildlife Federation. “Now more than ever, our public lands must be managed in a balanced way that ensures wildlife and the landscape thrive for generations to come.”