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Newly-released statistics reveal how the Trump administration successfully eliminated the leadership at the Bureau of Land Management. Former Interior Secretary David Bernhardt’s decision to “relocate” jobs to an ostensible new headquarters in Grand Junction, Colorado led to the departure of nearly 90 percent of BLM employees from the DC office.
Out of the 328 positions targeted for moving out West, 287 employees retired or found new jobs between July 2019 and December 2020 — leaving just 41 people to move with their jobs.
Aaron Weiss, deputy director at the Center for Western Priorities, told Colorado Public Radio that the job statistics reveal why the Trump administration had refused to release details about the move.
“What it looks like, because of all of that secrecy, is that this headquarters move has just been a total failure,” Weiss said. “And it was, as we expected, just a move to eviscerate the agency and centralize control, ironically, with Secretary Bernhardt in Washington, D.C.”
Sally Jewell on repairing the damage
In a new must-listen episode of CWP's podcast, "The Landscape," former Interior Secretary Sally Jewell weighs in on how the Biden administration can start to repair the damage of the Trump/Bernhardt years, the importance of President Biden's executive order on climate change, and how listening to everyone is the key to creating lasting change.
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It’s part of a living cultural landscape that’s important to people that are there now. Being able to confirm it as a place and that there’s physical form to this story — I think that’s very important.”
