Here’s a simple timeline: during President Trump’s first term in office, he enacted measures to support Big Business and industry and absolutely destroyed everything that had been done to the environment previously. Like the Paris Climate Agreement that he withdrew from, again. Or declaring a “national energy emergency” to justify doubling down on drilling and mining. All of the hard work that lobbyists, environmentalists and President Obama with his administration had done were thrown down the drain. During President Biden’s term he created a group under an executive order titled, “Unleashing American Energy.” According to AIP, “The group produced estimates of the social cost of greenhouse gases, including human health effects, property damage, and disruption of energy systems, for use in cost-benefit policy analyses.”
Only four years later, Trump has made decisions reversing this hard work that are benefiting only a small, miniscule portion of the American population. Some of the decisions include legislation passed to drill on national park land, or the mass firing of thousands of governmental employees.
For people who are connected to land, care about the environment and believe in climate change (because it is very real), this is like getting slapped in the face by the President. He is making decisions that are going to drastically harm the environment and the damage could be completely irreparable.
When will it stop? When he has extracted everything he can from every corner of the earth? America’s public lands are some of the last untouched ecosystems and reserves of nature in the world. Humans leave an impact on the natural world everywhere they go. If we tap into the protected lands that are owned by the American people and privatize and sell them, we are losing more than just a pretty place. It speaks volumes for where the world, and the country is headed.
Instead of sitting and complaining about the devastation that the President is causing, people need to do something about it. Those who care need to get to a place where being upset about what is happening to the world and the environment will enact change and spark activism. Speaking up about what is happening and showing dissatisfaction with the government is the first step to enacting change.
A documentary about public lands produced by Patagonia, titled “Public Trust”, depicts the tragedy of taking away public lands from citizens within the country. Slowly, president Trump will work to make this happen and with a government that is almost completely in his favor, he will have an easier time passing such legislation that will demolish something so unique about America.
As shown in the documentary, citizens across the nation were fighting for various lands to stay protected and public. In 2016, natives and environmental activists in Utah accomplished protection and claimed Bears Ears as a national monument on December 28 under the Antiquities Act. A year later in December 2017, President Trump successfully cut out 85% of the monument, shrinking it from 1.35 million acres to around 228,700 acres, according to Harvard University Research. This effectively opened up the land to be subject to oil mining, drilling and environmental tragedy. The extensive controversy regarding the monument was fought and advocated intensely for many years. Read more about the efforts here.
Since his inauguration, President Trump has worked hard to help satisfy the wants and needs of the richest and most powerful people in the country, including himself. Only a month into his presidency, the new administration “fired about 1,000 newly hired National Park Service employees who maintain and clean parks, educate visitors and perform other functions as part of its broad-based effort to downsize government,” according to AP.
Continuous abuse of power from the current president is causing many people to be unhappy with the government. Revoking or altering public lands that have been preserved for decades, particularly vast areas, is unjust. It is highly apparent that it is serving only a small group of people that are ready to jump in and “drill baby drill”.
Land and the environment should never be a political issue, but the polarization of the government and the state in which the country is in has led us to this place. It shouldn’t matter if you want to use the land to ride your mountain bike or to go hunt deer. It shouldn’t be a place where someone can only fish or only swim. These places are special because like the foundation of the country, they are unique and diverse. The multitude of uses and opportunities that are tied to these lands are far beyond the selfish uses of a government that is looking to take control.
The simple answer to all of the chaos and movement happening within the government, to our country and the environment is: not everything should be politicised. The environment and the land that we live on and enjoy should not be a right or left issue. Not everything has to be black and white, but that is what this administration is working towards. The polarization of the country via political parties, a constructed method to create a divide, will be the downfall of the “Land of the Free”.
