Trump Administration’s latest budget reflects anti-conservation values
The plan would decimate public land agencies, open the door for more drilling and mining
Despite all the stewardship rhetoric from the former oil and gas lobbyist leading the Interior Department, the Trump administration’s proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2021 would cut funding for conservation, parks, endangered species, and climate change research while bolstering fossil fuel production on public lands. The budget calls for a 16 percent cut across the department’s budget, and individual agency cuts would cripple America’s land managers, opening the door for more drilling and mining.
Again, the budget proposes defunding conservation programs Interior Secretary David Bernhardt has claimed to support. The budget calls for a 97 percent cut to the Land and Water Conservation Fund — a program that was given overwhelming support from Congress when it was permanently reauthorized just last year. Secretary Bernhardt requested using just $14.7 million in discretionary funds for the program, which is a tiny fraction of the $900 million that is allocated annually to the program.
Although Secretary Bernhardt would have you believe the department is impartial to different energy resources, the budget calls for $392.8 million to support offshore oil and gas development and $195.5 million for onshore oil and gas development. Just $29.5 million is proposed for creating renewable energy production on public lands and $26.5 million for offshore wind and tidal energy development.
The National Park Service would see a budget decrease of half a billion dollars and lose nearly 1,000 jobs across the park service units, impacting the agency’s ability to protect our national treasures. This plan falls in line with the administration’s proposals to privatize many services at national parks to appease park concessionaires. The budget would also cut funding for cultural resource management by $3.3 million. The budget fails to provide funding for the backlog of maintenance projects at national parks, punting on the problem by calling on Congress to pass new legislation to create an infrastructure fund to address the issue.
The budget also escalates the Trump administration’s war on science, proposing a $300 million cut to research at the US Geological Survey, and the elimination of more than 800 research jobs. Vital investigations into climate change would be hit especially hard under Bernhardt’s proposal — but research into mineral and energy resources is left untouched.
Other land management agencies would see major budget cuts, including the Bureau of Land Management ($144 million reduction), the US Fish and Wildlife Service ($265 million reduction), the Bureau of Reclamation ($532 million reduction), and the US Geological Survey ($300 million reduction).
The Trump administration also proposed spending $1.5 billion over 10 years to develop a national uranium reserve, a move aimed to shore up the uranium industry. Over the past three years, the administration has catered to mining companies, removing more than a million acres of public lands from Bears Ears National Monument to make way for uranium mining, considering lifting the uranium mining ban around the Grand Canyon, and declaring uranium a mineral critical to national security.
This budget makes President Trump and Secretary Bernhardt’s priorities clear — weaken the Interior Department’s ability to protect public lands while simultaneously opening them up to extractive industries. Thankfully, bipartisan majorities in Congress have rejected similar budget proposals in the past. With extreme cuts that would endanger our public lands, waters, and wildlife, this budget is likely dead on arrival.
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