NRDC Sues to Block Trump's Gutting of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments
WASHINGTON, D.C. — NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), Earthjustice, and the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA), filed a federal lawsuit challenging the Trump administration's proclamations that stripped protections from more than 2.9 million acres across Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments in Utah. The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of D.C., argues that the Antiquities Act does not give the president the power to dismantle national monuments created by his predecessors.
The July 13 proclamations shrank each monument to less than 10% of their prior size, one of the largest rollbacks of public land protections in U.S. history. The action came weeks after Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Rep. Celeste Maloy (R-UT-02) failed to advance a Congressional Review Act resolution attacking Grand Staircase-Escalante’s management plan, which collapsed without a Senate vote in June.
Following is a statement from Christy Goldfuss, executive director at NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council):
“These monuments protect places that took millions of years to form. President Trump is trying to destroy them with a stroke of a pen. That cannot stand. The administration is trying to force this through by executive fiat. The Antiquities Act does not work that way. Presidents have the power to create national monuments to protect what belongs to all of us, but Congress never gave them the power to tear those monuments down.
“Once you open these lands to mining and drilling, what gets lost is not coming back – ancient cliff dwellings, dinosaur fossils found nowhere else on Earth, sacred sites tied to the Tribal Nations. Tribes led the fight for Bears Ears. Local communities, ranchers, scientists, and outfitters built the record behind Grand Staircase-Escalante. Three in four Utahns want these monuments kept whole. This lawsuit is about honoring the people who built these places and the law that made them possible. We are prepared to stay in this fight as long as it takes.”
Background
Bears Ears National Monument was established in 2016 at the urging of the Hopi Tribe, Navajo Nation, Pueblo of Zuni, Ute Indian Tribe, and Ute Mountain Ute Tribe. The monument protects over 100,000 cultural sites, including cliff dwellings, kivas, granaries, and rock art. The 2016 proclamation created the Bears Ears Commission, formally recognizing the five Tribes' role in co-stewarding the land alongside federal agencies.
Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument was established in 1996 and protects some of the most scientifically significant landscapes on the Colorado Plateau. The current BLM management plan was finalized in 2024 after extensive consultation with Tribal Nations, the State of Utah, local governments, ranchers, outfitters, and the public.
The July 13, 2026 proclamations mark the second time President Trump has attempted to dismantle these monuments. In December 2017, Trump signed proclamations reducing Bears Ears by approximately 85 percent and Grand Staircase-Escalante by roughly 47 percent. NRDC sued at that time alongside coalition partners. President Biden restored both monuments to their full boundaries in October 2021. On June 23, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit remanded separate challenges to Biden's restoration by monument opponents back to the district court for further consideration, leaving the restored boundaries in place while that case proceeds.
Support for the monuments is broad. According to 2026 State of the Rockies polling, 91 percent of Western voters say existing national monument designations should be kept in place. Three in four Utah voters, including a majority of Republicans, support keeping Grand Staircase-Escalante as a national monument. Seventy-one percent support continuing to keep Bears Ears as a national monument.
View the Bears Ears National Monument Complaint here and the Grand Staircase National Monument Complaint here.
For more information, check out our previous statement, explore White House Watch, tracking attacks on our environment, including this one, and our litigation tracker to see how NRDC is fighting back.
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NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) is an international nonprofit environmental organization with more than 3 million members and online activists. Established in 1970, NRDC uses science, policy, law and people power to confront the climate crisis, protect public health and safeguard nature. NRDC has offices in New York City, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Beijing and Delhi (an office of NRDC India Pvt. Ltd).