Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke has recommended scaling back 10 of the 27 national monuments under a review directed by President Trump.
The scale of the monument changes was disclosed in a draft memorandum obtained by several news services on Sunday night. The White House said in a statement that it does not comment on leaked documents.
According to the memo, Zinke would shrink 4 of the monuments on the list, and significantly alter the rules of land use for the remaining six.
The memo went to President Trump last month but the administration would not disclose which monuments would be altered based on Zinke’s review. Trump will make a decision based on the recommendations made in the memo.
The four monuments that Zinke would have Trump narrow in size would include Utah’s Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, Nevada’s Gold Butte, and Oregon’s Cascade-Siskiyou. No details were provided on the exact size of the reductions.
The changes recommended for the remaining monuments in the memo would relax restrictions on certain previously forbidden activities, such as timber harvesting and mining. Those changes would include the two marine national monuments that are the Pacific Remote Islands and Rose Atol, according to the Washington Post.
“It appears that certain monuments were designated to prevent economic activity such as grazing, mining and timber production rather than to protect specific objects,” the memo read, according to the Post.
The memo is a draft document, which the White House emphasized as one of the principal reasons for not commenting on it.
“The Trump administration does not comment on leaked documents, especially internal drafts which are still under review by the president and relevant agencies,” White House spokeswoman Kelly Love said in a statement issued to news outlets late Sunday night.
Conservation groups began issuing statements responding to the changes with alarm, threatening litigation if Trump decides to implement the recommendations in the draft.
“If President Trump acts in support of these recommendations, the Wilderness Society will move swiftly to challenge those actions in court,” said that group’s president, Jamie Williams. “We urge the president to ignore these illegal and dangerous recommendations and instead act to preserve our natural wonders that are at the core of a great nation.”
