Southwestern tribes push for a new national monument near the Grand Canyon

A coalition of Native American tribes in the Southwest is lobbying the Biden administration to create a sprawling national monument to protect federal lands adjacent to Grand Canyon National Park from uranium mining and other development.

Members of the Grand Canyon Tribal Coalition, which includes the Havasupai, Hopi, Hualapai and nine other tribes, held a news conference Wednesday to officially call for approximately 1.1 million acres north and south of the park to be appoint as Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni. Grand Canyon National Monument.

Edmon Tilousi, vice president of the Havasupai tribe, told reporters that a monument would protect tribal ancestral lands, cultural sites and water resources from the harmful effects of mining. The area is rich in uranium.

“We simply cannot live without these clean waters,” Tilousi said. “As guardians of the Grand Canyon, we have a duty not only to our ancestors… but also to our children and future generations.”

Several tribes in the area have deep cultural and spiritual ties to the Grand Canyon, connections that the tribes hope to see reflected in the name of the proposed monument. “Baaj Nwaavjo” means “where the tribes roam” in the Havasupai language. “I’tah Kukveni” means “our footprints” in Hopi.

A monument designation under the Antiquities Act of 1906 would consolidate a current 20-year mining ban that the Obama administration implemented in 2012. In 2017, after a multi-year legal battle, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for USA upheld the Obama-era ban, concluding that temporarily freezing the mining concessions “will allow for a more careful and longer-term study of the uncertain effects of uranium mining in the area and for better-informed decision-making in the future.”

The Trump administration publicly opposed legislation that sought to permanently protect the same area from mining for uranium and other hard rock, and in 2020 launched a plan to revive America’s domestic uranium industry.

The tribal coalition and allied groups hope President Joe Biden will act to permanently protect an area he has called “an irreplaceable jewel.”

Joining tribal leaders at Wednesday’s press conference were Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) and Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), who introduced similar bills in 2019 to ban new uranium mining. around the Grand Canyon.

“We officially call on the administration to designate these areas of the Grand Canyon as a national monument, to protect our water and cultural heritage while providing recreational opportunities that our communities in northern Arizona depend on,” Sinema said. “Fortunately for the administration, we have already done the hard work. We have proposed a framework that we will use to work with the administration and our coalition over the coming months to create the monument under the Antiquities Act.”

The push comes just weeks after Biden created two new national monuments — Avi Kwa Ame in Nevada and Castner Range in Texas — encompassing a combined 513,000 acres.

Grijalva said the national campaign for the designation of a monument is the culmination of a 20-year effort to protect the great landscape of the Grand Canyon. And he noted that it comes on the heels of House Republicans passing an energy package late last month, dubbed the “Polluters Over People Act” by critics, that seeks to dismantle Biden’s climate agenda. and order more drilling and mining on public lands in the United States.

“The threat and danger to the Grand Canyon is greater than ever,” he said. “HR 1 will make the Grand Canyon an expendable asset. It will develop, sell and trade this iconic public land for private gain. If they’re willing to do it with the Grand Canyon, then none of our land is safe from this kind of rampant greed.”

The monument campaign “is not just about making history, it is about saving history and its spirit and the people who honor the canyon,” added Grijalva.

The White House did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment. Grijalva said the administration is aware of the effort and discussions have already taken place at the staff level.

Tim Nuvangyaoma, chairman of the Hopi tribe, said securing monument status for the area is “the highest priority for the Hopi people.”

“The creator gave us a gift, and that gift is in the shape of a great cannon,” he said. “That gift is not just to the tribal nations that have that intimate connection to him, but it is a gift to the state of Arizona. It is a gift to the United States. It is a gift to the whole world. So we have to protect the beauty and grandeur of this area we call home.”