Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Representative Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) More than 50 Democrats It called on the Department of the Interior to expand federal protections in the Arctic.
The Interior Department in July sought comment on whether to add more protections to 23 million acres in the western Arctic. The department began designating so-called special areas in the region in the 1970s and most recently in April when the Biden administration expanded protections to 13 million acres across five special areas.
In addition to Markey and Huffman, the letter was signed by Senators Martin Heinrich (D-MN), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Ron Wyden (D-Oregon), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Peter Welch (D-VT), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon), as well as 45 other Democratic members of the House of Representatives.
“This opportunity to revisit needed protections is particularly timely, as the impacts of climate change in the Arctic – including declining sea ice, thawing permafrost and record warming temperatures – are being felt more acutely than ever, and new extractive developments increasingly encroach on critical habitats and livelihoods,” they wrote.
The Interior Department issued a request for comment in July. “As our climate changes rapidly, special areas are increasingly important to caribou migration and herd health, other wildlife, migratory birds and native plants,” Bureau of Land Management Director Tracy Stone Manning said in a statement at the time.
Environmentalists have broadly supported the administration's recent actions in the Arctic, including its June announcement to block plans to build the Ambler Highway, which would have led to copper and cobalt deposits, and to prevent mining on 28 million acres of protected land.
But they were widely critical of the Interior Department's announcement last year that it would approve the proposed Willow Drilling project in Alaska.
