Sierra Club: Trump’s Alaska Orders a Threat to Fragile Landscapes, Wildlife, and Communities

WASHINGTON, D.C. - This week, the House Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee conducted a hearing on exploiting fragile Alaskan landscapes for the benefit of fossil fuel companies.

The hearing on "Unleashing Alaska's Extraordinary Resource Potential," focused on oil and gas and mining opportunities in the state.

Leveraging the state's resource potential has been a focus of the Trump administration. In January, in one of his first official acts back in the White House, Donald Trump signed an executive order directing the federal government to maximize the development of extractive projects on federal and state lands in Alaska, fast-track permitting of energy projects, and prioritize liquefied natural gas development in the state.

Trump's allies in the House have responded to this agenda in recent weeks, voting to overturn Resource Management Plans in the western United States, including Alaska, in an unprecedented move to revoke environmental protections and boost extractive industrial development.

In response, Athan Manuel, director of Sierra Club's Lands Protection Program, released the following statement:

"Alaska is home to some of the wildest public lands in the United States, vital to wildlife and sacred to Alaska Native communities. Donald Trump and his allies want to hand these places over to corporate polluters to drill, mine, and exploit as they please. It is a clear threat to the communities and wildlife that rely on these landscapes. Moreover, the actions of this administration and its congressional allies threaten to throw the management of hundreds of millions of acres of public lands into chaos. It's an unprecedented attack on the common grounds of the American people."

About the Sierra Club

The Sierra Club is America's largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with millions of members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit https://www.sierraclub.org.