1. United States
2. Mass.
3. Letter

Last night, Trump signed away 13.3 million acres of Alaska. Using the Congressional Review Act—a fast-track legislative tool that allows federal protections to be erased with a simple majority vote—he overturned the Central Yukon Resource Management Plan. This plan took over a decade of work by Alaskans, tribes, scientists, and land managers to create. Once repealed, similar protections cannot be reinstated. The rollback is permanent by design. 13.3 million acres of public land in central and northern Alaska are now open to mining and industrial extraction. The Arctic Refuge’s coastal plain—where the Porcupine Caribou Herd calves and where Gwich’in communities depend on the land for food—is once again available for oil drilling. This decision also clears the path for the Ambler industrial mining road: a 211-mile corridor slicing through the wild landscape surrounding Gates of the Arctic National Park. The road threatens salmon runs and caribou populations that are already at historic lows and in crisis. These are not abstract policy changes. They endanger food security, subsistence hunting grounds, clean water, and the wildlife that sustain entire communities—sacrificed for industrial and foreign interests. Repealing the plan makes it easier to fast-track industrial access while reducing Indigenous voices and traditional knowledge in federal decision-making, despite Alaska Native communities bearing the greatest impact from mining. Please stop this.