Public Lands in Danger: Congress's Budget Reconciliation
- Josefina Barrantes
- 1 hour ago
- 7 min read
Last Thursday, on May 22nd, the House finalized the language and passed their budget reconciliation bill, or “One Big Beautiful Act” by a 215-214 vote. Before they finalized their version, an amendment was removed from the bill package that would have sold off half a million acres of public lands in Nevada and Utah. This is positive, and it means that the pressure from their constituents who care about public lands is working. Unfortunately, the bill is still the worst environmental bill the House has ever passed, and there are still terrible provisions that need to be removed.
What is the budget reconciliation process?
The federal budget reconciliation process is the congressional process that allows for expedited consideration of certain legislative changes, particularly in changes that affect spending, revenue, and the debt limit. The process ends up providing a streamlined path to pass legislation that is aligned with Congress’s stated budget goals. Since the budget has passed the House, it now has to go through the Senate. Once both chambers of Congress pass identical versions of the bill, it is then signed into law by the president.
The environment isn’t the only important issue on the chopping block with this process. This nasty bill package also includes deep cuts to beneficial programs such as Medicaid and SNAP that will impact low-income individuals and families immediately and harshly.
Environmental Provisions in the Budget Reconciliation That Remain
“Pay to Play” (Section 80151): This section allows entities to circumvent the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by creating a pay-to-play option for non-federal entities. By paying a fee, these entities can shield environmental analysis of all kinds of projects, including timber projects, from judicial scrutiny.
The proposal would amend the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to permit project sponsors to pay a fee entitling them to a recklessly accelerated environmental review. This approach risks prioritizing financial interests over public welfare and environmental protection. This section also shields project sponsors from judicial review. Federal courts have played an essential role in ensuring agency compliance with NEPA. Blocking judicial review will weaken the effectiveness of NEPA by reducing accountability, transparency, and public participation.
25% Mandate (Sections 80313 and 80314): Increases timber production by a minimum of 25% over the recent years’ average sale volume for the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. This arbitrary increase in logging will occur regardless of the impacts it could cause, be it worsening wildfires due to clear-cutting or reducing our federal forests' climate and clean water benefits.
Sections 80313 and 80314 require the US Forest Service (USFS) and BLM to arbitrarily log 125% of the amount of timber sold between Fiscal Years 2020 through 2024 on the public lands they manage. These extremely harmful sections are singularly about boosting logging to benefit the timber industry while harming other National Forest System values and the users who rely on them. More logging will not necessarily protect communities from wildfire or improve forest conditions. In fact, with the only or primary metric being volume of wood, it will likely make wildfires worse, given that the USFS and BLM will be pressured to target the biggest, oldest, and most fire-resilient trees – the ones that contain the most timber volume. This leaves behind the small brush that increases wildfire risk.
Roadless Area Conservation Rule Loophole (Section 80313): The logging mandated under the bill will open up roadless areas by allowing logging under any forest plans that don’t reference the roadless rule and allowing the increased timber harvest to take place in many Roadless Areas across the country.
Increasing timber production means cutting down more big, old trees, since the biggest trees produce the most lumber. Once an old-growth tree is cut, it will take longer than a human lifetime to replace it. This means the Pacific Northwest, where more stands of mature and old-growth trees remain on federal lands, could be particularly impacted by the policy proposal.
Our mature and old-growth trees and forests are worth more standing. They provide clean air and water, as well as critical habitat for spotted owls, wild salmon, and other iconic wildlife, and importantly, provide a buffer against wildfire as they are the most fire-resistant. National forest lands offer places to recreate and access to nature as a critical public health benefit, and they hold enormous cultural and spiritual value. As climate change makes summer temperatures hotter and hotter every year, the forests cool our air and absorb and store carbon in their leaves, branches, trunks, and soil.
20-year Stewardship Contracts: This bill calls for ramping up logging across federal forests by mandating that the Forest Service enter into at least one long-term timber contract per year for 10 years in each region. A similar provision applies to the Bureau of Land Management. This might force harmful logging to occur that is not even economical, let alone ecologically appropriate.
Alaska’s Arctic Refuge (Section 80121): The Arctic is one of our nation’s most majestic landscapes and the traditional homeland of Indigenous peoples who have stewarded and relied upon the lands from time immemorial. The Arctic is home to an abundance of wildlife, including caribou, polar bears, and birds that flock to these northern lands from all over the globe to raise their young.
President Trump is pushing for increased oil and gas production across the Arctic despite the climate and ecological consequences. The bill, if passed, would mandate the auctioning of 1.6 million acres in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil companies.
Beyond the major ecological concerns of drilling in the Arctic, mandated lease sales in the Refuge have already proven to be a financial failure, not once, but twice. A mandated lease sale under President Trump in 2021 generated less than 1% of the $1.8 billion in projected revenue, failing to offset Trump’s first tax cuts. This previous outcome makes it obvious that offering these lands for lease is not a revenue-raiser and doesn’t belong in a budget bill.
Section 80121 mandates leasing and permitting for drilling for oil and gas production in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In mandating four lease sales of 400,000 acres or more over the next 10 years, the bill also deletes public input opportunities and judicial review. This provision is a craven and cowardly way to exploit one of our most iconic landscapes without review, accountability, or real process for Americans and experts to weigh in. Beyond the major ecological concerns of drilling in the Arctic, mandated lease sales in the Refuge have already proven to be a financial failure, not once, but twice. A mandated lease sale under President Trump in 2021 generated less than one percent of the $1.8 billion in projected revenue, and today, no leases are currently held in the Refuge.
Onshore oil and gas (Sections 80101 - 80105 & 80161): Sections 80101 through 80105 contain a vast array of de facto subsidies, procedural end-runs, and pay-to-play provisions that cement the oil and gas industry as the preferred tenant on American public lands and sell those lands out to the highest bidder. These sections mandate quarterly lease sales in most Western states; require all industry-nominated acreage to be offered within 18 months; resurrect the abusive practice of noncompetitive leasing; crush environmental review and public input opportunities with aggressive timelines if a nominal fee is paid; and drop the federal onshore royalty rate firmly below the rate charged by any major oil and gas producing state – from 16.67% to 12.5%.
Additionally, Section 80161 silences the American public by charging a “protest filing fee” for challenging any lease sale or drilling permit. Taken together, these provisions and incentives put the oil and gas industry firmly in the driver’s seat to take control of our public lands with scarcely little recourse for the Department of the Interior – or concerned members of the public – to protect water, wildlife, or cultural resources.
Take Action
Taken together, these provisions represent one of the most serious attacks on our environment in recent memory. The next steps for these provisions in Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” will involve committee review (either through the Senate Agriculture Committee or the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, or potentially both), and Senate floor consideration in the coming weeks.
Senate Republicans have indicated that they want to pass the final bill before July 4th.
Please reach out to your Senators and ask them to take every available action to oppose these provisions. Find your U.S. Senators here.
Sample message for email:
I am your constituent, and I need you to actively and publicly oppose and to vote NO on the budget reconciliation bill that sells out our public lands and ocean, raises my energy bills by undercutting key programs and clean energy tax breaks, and eviscerates the rule of law in this country. I strongly oppose budget reconciliation provisions that include any of the following:
** Opening the Arctic and other cherished public lands and oceans to oil and gas drilling, coal and hardrock mining, and logging
** Creating loopholes that allow polluters to ‘pay-to-pollute' and circumvent bedrock environmental laws like the National Environmental Policy Act and Endangered Species Act to evade accountability from communities and courts
** Attacks on environmental health and Medicaid
** Building the border wall through sensitive habitats and communities between the U.S. and Mexico
This bill means fewer resources to tackle our most pressing environmental crises, while polluting industries reap the benefits. It means extracting resources from public lands and waters to fund tax breaks for the wealthy while the rest of us are left with the harms caused by their profit. It means taking away people’s healthcare and cutting funding for federal agencies that are tasked with helping communities that face disasters. It means increasing costs and putting financial stress on our families to line the pockets of billionaires. It also means that the courts would not be able to stop the dire harms from the Trump agenda.
As your constituent, I need you to fight for our most pressing issues. I am watching you to see whether you will fight for polluters and billionaires or fight for the public good.
Sincerely,
[Your name]
For our EPIC Members in California;
Thank you for your help in protecting our forests, rivers, and wildlife!