SALT LAKE CITY — Interior Secretary Deb Haaland has made her recommendation about whether to reverse President Donald Trump’s decision to downsize two sprawling national monuments in Utah — but it wasn’t known Friday what she decided.
The Interior Department gave her report to President Biden on Wednesday, according to a court filing Thursday in a legal battle that began more than three years ago after Trump’s decision.
It doesn’t say what is in that report. U.S. Department of Justice attorneys mentioned the report as part of a request for more time to address the judge’s question if the legal battle has become a moot point.
Interior Department spokeswoman Melissa Schwartz declined to provide any information about the report.
Haaland traveled to Utah in April to visit the monuments as she became the latest cabinet official to step into a public lands tug-of-war ongoing for years.
President Joe Biden asked her to research whether the boundaries of Bears Ears National Monument and Grand Staircase-Escalante should be restored.
Native American tribes supported the creation of Bears Ears by President Barack Obama, but Republican state leaders opposed it. Grand Staircase is older, but has long been a point of contention for conservative state leaders who consider both monuments U.S. government overreach.
