John,
National monuments are critical infrastructure that protects drinking water, stabilizes our climate, and shields communities from the worst impacts of a warming world.
Recent analyses show that watersheds in or downstream of 31 national monuments supply drinking water to more than 13 million people. In many cases, monument status is the only protection these rivers and streams have. Strip it away, and entire water systems are left vulnerable to contamination from mining, drilling, and industrial development.
Donald Trump has already shown us what this looks like. During his first term, he slashed Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, opening the door to extraction in sensitive headwaters. Now his administration is again pushing plans to shrink or even revoke monument protections entirely, something no president has ever successfully done before.
Weakening monuments does not just endanger landscapes. It threatens clean water, worsens drought and wildfire risk, accelerates climate pollution, and puts downstream communities, often low-income, rural, and Indigenous communities, directly in harm’s way.
Urge Secretary Burgum to uphold full protections for every national monument. Our water, our climate, and the well-being of future generations depend on strong leadership now.
National monuments also play a powerful role in climate resilience. Intact forests, wetlands, and soils store enormous amounts of carbon, helping slow climate change while buffering floods, droughts, and extreme heat. In arid regions already facing water scarcity, protected lands keep water cleaner and more reliable by preserving natural hydrology.
When these protections are dismantled, the damage is clear. Rivers become polluted. Aquifers are stressed. Communities pay more to treat drinking water, if they can treat it at all. Once watersheds are compromised, the harm can last generations.
These lands uphold a moral obligation to protect the systems that sustain life, not sacrifice them for short-term corporate profit. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum needs to hear clearly that dismantling national monument protections would be a grave mistake.
Tell Secretary Burgum to stop Trump’s monument rollbacks and defend clean water and climate protections now.
Together, we can defend the lands that protect us all.
– DFA AF Team
