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President-elect Donald Trump announced he would nominate North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum to be his Secretary of the Interior. Burgum is a former software executive who organized a dinner at Mar-a-Lago earlier this year where Trump suggested oil and gas executives raise $1 billion for his campaign.
"We're going to do things with energy and with land interior that is going to be incredible," Trump said Thursday night.
At Interior, Burgum will oversee 20 percent of America's lands, despite coming from a state with very little national public land. The federal government owns less than 4 percent of North Dakota's land, and the majority of that is managed by the Department of Agriculture, not Interior.
Trump made his announcement at the America First Policy Institute Gala, hosted by the organization that is effectively running Trump's transition. The New York Times reported that former Interior secretary and fossil fuel lobbyist David Bernhardt is preparing a slate of day-one executive orders to boost the oil industry. Bernhardt praised Trump's choice of Burgum Thursday night.
Jennifer Rokala, executive director at the Center for Western Priorities, was skeptical of the nomination.
“Running the Interior department requires someone who can find balance between recreation, conservation, hunting, ranching, mining, and—yes—oil drilling,” Rokala said. “If Doug Burgum tries to turn America’s public lands into an even bigger cash cow for the oil and gas industry, or tries to shrink America’s parks and national monuments, he’ll quickly discover he’s on the wrong side of history.”
Choo choo! The NEPA case that's disguised as an oil train
In the latest episode of CWP's podcast, The Landscape, Kate and Aaron talk to Sanjay Narayan, managing attorney of the Sierra Club’s Environmental Law Program, about a lawsuit over the proposed Uinta Basin oil train that could have major implications for the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The case is set to be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court in December.
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They keep coming up with different flavors of metaphorical Febreze to spray on this thing.”
