The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has voted to advance Steve Pearce as the next director of the Bureau of Land Management. The nomination will now move to the Senate, where Pearce’s confirmation is almost certain, as there do not seem to be enough senators that oppose it.
Opponents of Pearce’s nomination point out he has a track record of promoting the shrinking of national monuments and the sell-off of public lands, making him a controversial choice to lead an agency that manages approximately 245 million acres of public surface land and an additional 700 million acres of subsurface mineral rights.
“Every senator who voted for this public-lands hater showed they’re willing to let our country’s wildest places be torn up and sold for parts to make billionaires richer,” said Ryan Beam, national public lands advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity, in response to the vote. “Steve Pearce is Trump’s hand-picked hatchet man to liquidate the West for private profit. The American people repeatedly say they want public lands to be protected. Instead, we’ve got senators allowing an industry puppet to call the shots.”
Several other groups also reacted to the vote, expressing hope that the Senate could reject Pearce’s nomination, though it is highly unlikely. A full Senate vote could occur within the next week.
“The American people want to keep public lands in public hands and want them managed for future generations. Nothing about Steve Pearce's troubling record or performance in the hearing suggests he wants to do either,” said Jordan Schreiber, director of government relations at The Wilderness Society. “It's disappointing that one side of the aisle in the Senate committee ignored the public and allowed his nomination to move forward. The full Senate should reject it."
“Today’s vote was disappointing. Anyone who cares about the future of public lands, national monuments, or the redrock knows that Steve Pearce has fundamentally disqualifying views and should not hold the position of Director of the Bureau of Land Management,” said Travis Hammill, DC Director of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. “We call on Senators to reject Pearce’s nomination when it is brought to the Senate floor. While the Trump Administration continues its deeply unpopular efforts to undermine public lands protections, SUWA will continue our work, undeterred, to protect Utah’s redrock country for current and future generations.”
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