Republicans vote to roll back Biden-era restrictions on mining and drilling in 3 Western states

WASHINGTON (AP) — Congressional Republicans voted Thursday to roll back restrictions on mining, drilling and other development in three Western states, advancing President Donald Trump’s ambitions to expand energy production from public lands.

Senators voted 50-46 to repeal land management plans that were adopted in the final weeks of Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration for large areas of Alaska, Montana and North Dakota.

That timing made the plans vulnerable to the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to terminate rules that are finalized near the end of a president’s term. The resolutions require a simple majority in each chamber and take effect upon the president’s signature.

The House approved the repeals last month in votes largely along party lines. Trump is expected to sign the measures, which will boost a proposed 211-mile road through an Alaska wilderness to allow mining of copper, cobalt, gold and other minerals.

Trump ordered approval of the Ambler Road project earlier this week, saying it will unlock access to copper, cobalt and other critical minerals that the United States needs to compete with China on artificial intelligence and other resource development. Copper is used in the production of cars, electronics and even renewable energy technologies such as wind turbines.

The road was approved in Trump’s first term, but was later blocked by Biden after an analysis determined the project would threaten caribou and other wildlife and harm Alaska Native tribes that rely on hunting and fishing.

The Biden-era restrictions also included a block on new mining leases in the nation’s most productive coal-producing region, the Powder River Basin in Montana and Wyoming. On Monday, the Trump administration held the biggest coal sale in that area in more than a decade, drawing a single bid of $186,000 for 167.5 million tons of coal, or about a tenth of a penny per ton.

Trump has largely cast aside Biden’s goal to reduce climate-warming emissions from the burning of coal and other fossil fuels extracted from federal land. Instead, he and congressional Republicans have moved to open more taxpayer-owned land to fossil fuel development, hoping to create more jobs and revenue. The Republican administration also has pushed to develop critical minerals, including copper, cobalt, gold and zinc.

A decision on whether to accept the recent bid from the Navajo Transitional Energy Co. is pending, and the lease cannot be issued until the Montana land plan is altered. The dirt-cheap value reflects dampened industry interest in coal despite Trump’s efforts. Many utilities have switched to cheaper natural gas or renewables such as wind and solar power.

Administration officials expressed disappointment that they did not receive “stronger participation” in the Montana sale. In a statement, Interior Department spokesperson Aubrie Spady blamed a “decades long war on coal” by Biden and former Democratic President Barack Obama.

Republican Sen. Tim Sheehy of Montana said the repeal of the land-management plan in his state was “putting an end to disastrous Biden-era regulations that put our resource economy on life support.”

Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan of Alaska called the Biden-era plan for 13 million acres in the central Yukon region “a clear case of federal overreach that locks up Alaska’s lands, ignores Alaska Native voices … and blocks access to critical energy, gravel & mineral resources.”

The GOP legislation “restores balance, strengthens U.S. energy & mineral security and upholds the law,” Sullivan said in a statement.

Democrats urged rejection of the repeals, arguing that Trump’s fossil fuel-friendly agenda is driving up energy prices because renewable sources are being sidelined even as the tech industry’s power demands soar for data centers and other projects.

“We are seeing dramatic increases in the price of energy for American consumers and businesses and the slashing of American jobs, so that Donald Trump can give an easy pass to the fossil fuel industry,” Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia said Wednesday on the Senate floor.

Last week, the administration canceled almost $8 billion in grants for clean energy projects in 16 states that Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris won in the 2024 election.

Ashley Nunes, public lands specialist at the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental group, said Republicans were unleashing “a wholesale assault on America’s public lands.” Using the Congressional Review Act to erase land management plans “will sow chaos across the country and turn our most cherished places into playgrounds for coal barons and industry polluters,” she said.

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Brown reported from Billings, Montana.