Eric Hunt / Wikimedia Commons
Why It Matters
A congressional effort backed by Utah’s entire Republican delegation to undo Biden-era management rules for one of the Southwest’s largest national monuments has lost its most powerful procedural tool. The outcome leaves 1.9 million acres of federal land in southern Utah operating under guidelines that Utah lawmakers argue are overly restrictive — and the path to changing that considerably steeper.
What Happened
Sen. Mike Lee and Rep. Celeste Maloy introduced a proposal in March to reverse a 2025 management plan governing Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in southern Utah. The plan set rules for camping, cattle grazing, road access, and other land uses — restrictions the lawmakers argued ran counter to Trump administration land management priorities.
To overturn the plan quickly, Lee and Maloy turned to the Congressional Review Act, a procedural mechanism that allows Congress to undo executive agency rules through an expedited process requiring only a simple majority vote. Had it succeeded, it would have marked the first time Congress used the CRA to undo a national monument management plan — and it would have permanently barred federal land managers from adopting any “substantially similar” framework in the future.
That window closed Thursday evening when the deadline for CRA action passed without a vote in either chamber. The fast-track pathway is now gone.
In a joint statement, Lee and Maloy signaled they have no intention of abandoning the effort. “While the CRA pathway is no longer available for this measure, our focus on this issue is unchanged,” they said.
By the Numbers
- 1.9 million acres — the size of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument
- 1996 — the year President Bill Clinton created the monument under the Antiquities Act
- 2017 — the year President Trump reduced the monument’s boundaries
- 2021 — the year Former President Biden restored the monument to its original size
- 60 votes — what Lee would need in the Senate to overcome a filibuster on any alternative legislative approach
Who Opposed It
Environmental groups and several Native American tribes pushed back against the CRA effort from the start. The Grand Staircase-Escalante Inter-Tribal Coalition argued that the 2025 management plan represented a meaningful step toward recognizing tribal interests in the region. Autumn Gillard, the coalition’s coordinator, said the plan “for the first time, heeded our voices and our Traditional Knowledge by establishing a framework for Tribal co-stewardship over our ancestral lands.”
The coalition responded publicly on Friday, framing the CRA deadline’s passage as a win for tribal communities with historical ties to the monument area.
Zoom Out
The fight over Grand Staircase-Escalante reflects a broader tug-of-war over federal land management that has played out for decades across the Mountain West. The monument itself has been a political football since Clinton designated it in 1996, and its boundaries have shifted with each change in administration — shrunk under Trump in 2017, restored under Biden in 2021.
Utah has long pushed for greater state and local control over federal lands within its borders, and the monument’s management rules — particularly those touching on road access and grazing — have been a persistent flashpoint for ranchers, off-road vehicle users, and rural communities in the region. Similar tensions over federal land use authority have surfaced in neighboring states, including legal disputes in eastern Oregon where federal land policy intersects with local water and property rights.
The CRA route was attractive precisely because it bypassed the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster threshold. Without it, any legislative push to alter the monument’s management plan faces a much higher bar in a closely divided Senate.
What’s Next
Lee and Maloy have indicated their effort will continue through other legislative means, though no specific alternative has been announced. Any bill targeting the management plan would face a difficult path in the Senate, where Lee would need to secure 60 votes to advance it past a filibuster. The Trump administration could also pursue executive or regulatory avenues to modify the management framework, though that process would carry its own legal and procedural challenges.
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