WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Bureau of Land Management has assured senators that – despite his long-held desire to sell off public lands for oil drilling and mining – he would not sell “large swaths” and would protect national monuments.
Environmentalists in Arizona say they’re not convinced, warning that Steve Pearce, a former New Mexico congressman whose critics have called him “Sell Off Steve,” would allow industry to ravage large areas of the West that are currently protected.
At his Feb. 25 confirmation hearing, Pearce called the Grand Canyon “one of the most magnificent things in the world” and promised to work with senators to maintain BLM-controlled wilderness areas around the national park.
“The monuments are something I do support deeply,” he said.
Environmentalists say Pearce’s record leaves them doubtful about his promises.
“Pearce has repeatedly supported selling or transferring federal public lands, backed fast‑tracked land sales, and co‑sponsored bills characterized by opponents as among the largest public‑land giveaways in U.S. history,” Bill Wade, executive director of the Association of National Park Rangers, said by email. “We believe all federal lands are public lands and should be retained as such.”
Pearce represented New Mexico in the U.S. House from 2003 to 2019, with a two-year gap when he ran unsuccessfully for the Senate. He lost a bid for governor in 2018 and later served as the state’s Republican Party chair.
During his seven terms In Congress, he repeatedly pushed legislation to sell off and reduce the scope of public lands, largely for oil drilling, mining and infrastructure.
In 2006, Pearce introduced a bill that would have given Western states and counties the right to pave any wagon path, dirt road or cattle trail that appeared on public lands if the route appeared on a map or survey before 1976. Opponents said the rule threatened national parks and wilderness areas.
In 2016, Pearce co-sponsored a bill that would have authorized the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Department of the Interior, which includes BLM, to sell public lands to local governments or make land swaps.
Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Bullhead City, introduced the 2016 bill, defending it at the time as a way to combat “poor federal land management policies” in areas with large swaths of federal land.
Taylor McKinnon, the Southwest director of the Center for Biological Diversity, called Pearce a “fox in the henhouse.”
“Deeds matter more than words. None of his groveling before the Senate changes his disqualifying track record. Pearce is unfit to serve,” McKinnon said.
Industry groups – the Arizona Mining Association, Western Energy Alliance, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and Public Lands Council – support Pearce.
“Having represented New Mexico in Congress and the state House for decades, former Rep. Steve Pearce understands the important role that public lands play across the West,” Kaitlynn Glover, executive director of the Public Lands Council and executive director of natural resources at the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, said after Trump nominated him.
“Pearce’s experience makes him thoroughly qualified to lead the BLM and tackle the issues federal lands ranchers are facing,” she said.
The Energy and Natural Resources Committee voted 11-9 on March 4 to send Pearce’s nomination to the full Senate.
The chairman, Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, called Pearce “qualified, capable and ready to serve.” Other Republicans echoed the praise.
A confirmation vote has not been scheduled yet.
Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., voted against the nomination in the committee, as did every other Democrat and one independent on the panel.
“We need leadership at the Bureau of Land Management that will protect public access, respect tribal sovereignty, and understand that these lands are not for sale,” Gallego said in a statement.
Critics of Pearce also cite his investments in the fossil fuel industry as a cause for concern.
In a financial disclosure filed in October, Pearce reported assets worth between $16 million and $46 million, including large holdings in Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Constellation Energy and Oneok, which provides services to the oil and gas industry.
In a Dec. 19 letter to the Office of Government Ethics, Pearce promised to divest his energy holdings. He assured the agency that he had already sold interests in a number of oil leases that appeared on the October filing.
Aaron Weiss, deputy director of the Center for Western Priorities, called Pearce’s ethics forms “woefully inadequate.”
“They leave room for massive conflicts of interest if he is confirmed,” Weiss said. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, he added, “views public lands as assets on a balance sheet. Pearce is the guy he wants running the Bureau of Land Management because Pearce has spent his whole career protecting the industry from which he profited at the expense of the public lands he’d be in charge of managing.”
A January “Conservation in the West” poll from Colorado College found widespread disapproval in eight Western states to drilling or mining on public lands. In Arizona, 74% of voters disapprove of selling off land for such uses.
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