5 things hikers should know about the Battle at Bear’s Ear

For the second time in less than a decade, the White House is trying to shrink Bears Ears National Monument. Following its first cut in 2017 and subsequent reversal, the Trump administration announced on July 12 that it would cut the size of Bears Ears by 91 percent. Where does that leave the magnificent, endangered Utah monument? Editor-in-Chief Adam Roy reveals five things hikers should know.

copy

On July 13, the Trump administration made sweeping cuts to Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, two national monuments that have been at the center of controversy for 30 years. This is the second time that the administration has tried to reduce them. The same was done in 2017, but those cuts were later reversed by incoming President Joe Biden.

Now, I’m very familiar with this story, especially Bears Ears. One of my first jobs was as a contributor to a newspaper in Moab, Utah, which was a common departure point for trips in the Bear Years. I’ve covered the story since the monument was first designated in 2016, and in 2019, I returned to Bears Ears with other Backpacker editors for our annual Editors’ Choice trip. Here are five things I think hikers should know about what’s happening in Bears Ears.

1. The latest cut of Bears Ears is massive.

This executive order shrinks the monument by 91 percent, or about 1.2 million acres. It’s an area that’s really hard to imagine, so by comparison, it’s about the same size as the Grand Canyon National Park.

Many important backpacking sites and cultural sites are now outside the boundaries of the national monument. They include Grand Gulch, which is a popular backpacking site, Cedar Mesa, which has one of the densest concentrations of Ancestral Puebloan architecture in the United States, Cheesebox Canyon, which is a spectacular slot canyon, and Valley of the Gods, which is a sweeping scenic canyon not dissimilar to Monument Valley.

2. It’s about mining, at least partly.

From the time the monument was first designated, a common argument used by opponents was that the monument would seal off important mineral deposits. It is not clear what exactly the extent of these deposits is, but we know that there has been exploration in the area in the past. In fact, in 2017, it was a major factor in how the Trump administration decided to redraw those borders.

The same is true in 2026 also. Citing the latest executive order, it says “critical minerals such as silver, copper, molybdenum, lead, uranium, vanadium and zinc” are one of the main reasons for shrinking bears’ ears. Again, it’s not really clear how much mining will occur if these changes continue, but some local residents have reason to be concerned. The history of uranium mining in this region in particular is fraught. By the middle of the century, it was a kind of mixed blessing. This supported the local economy, but it had a devastating impact on the health of the people who lived there.

Monticello, one of the towns closest to Bears Ears, was the site of a uranium mill from 1943 to 1960, and for decades thereafter, residents experienced increased rates of certain types of cancer. And they’re not the only cities in the region with a history filled with uranium mining. In Moab, the Atlas Mill processed uranium before it went bankrupt in 1998, leaving most of the cleanup costs on taxpayers.

3. This order changes the way Bears Ears is managed in a significant way.

In 2016, when the Obama administration first designated Bears Ears, it also established the Bears Ears Commission, an independent body with representatives from the five tribes that had petitioned the government to establish a national monument. They are the Navajo, Hopi, Zuni, Ute Mountain Ute, and Ute Indian Tribes of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation. Bears Ears is culturally and spiritually important to those five tribes. The idea behind the commission was that it would help advise and guide federal policy on Bears Ears and basically have a seat at the table.

This month’s executive order overturns that model. This expands the advisory committee for Bears Ears to 15 people. Five of them will be tribal representatives, four will be drawn from local and county government, and six will be appointed directly by the governor, with the idea that they will come from groups such as ranchers, private landowners and off-road vehicle operators. Now, because a lot of those groups, such as local governments and the governor of Utah, have generally been against maintaining protections for Bears Ears, this could really, really change how the monument is managed.

4. Local opinion on Bears Ears is mixed, more than you might think.

Now, this is going to get a little complicated, so bear with me. A major argument against Bears Ears is that it was named over the objections of local people, and in some cases, this is arguably true. The governments of three local towns, Bluff, Blanding and Monticello, have been consistently against maintaining Bears Ears’ protection as a national monument. San Juan County, where the monument is located, has often been against Bears Ears as a national monument, though not always – I’ll get to that later.

But this is not the whole story. Whenever we talk about local opinion and outsiders, we have to deal with the question of who gets to be a local, and in this case, it is a very complex issue. For one thing, Bears Ears abuts land belonging to many of the tribes who lobbied for its creation. The Navajo Nation borders it more or less directly, as Ute Mountain is part of the Ute Reservation. The other three tribes have deep historical ties to the region. These tribal governments petitioned the government to build Bears Ears and, when it became smaller, joined a lawsuit to restore it to its original size.

Then the question is how far can you go and still have hope for how to manage this kind of thing. Bears Ears is located in San Juan County, but the monument has a lot of support in Grand County, the next county to the north. Moab, the county seat, lies essentially on the line between the two. It’s about a two-hour drive from Bears Ears, which may seem like a lot, but by Southern Utah standards, it’s literally the next town over.

Grand County government has stood firmly in favor of Bears Ears. The economy there is largely based on outdoor recreation, and BLM lands like Bears Ears are a huge part of how it works. And even San Juan County, where Bears Ears is located, has not always been against the monument. Control of the county commission has changed hands several times since its creation. In 2018, a voting rights lawsuit forced the county to redraw its election districts and resulted in the election of the county’s first majority-Navajo commission. Subsequently, the county began supporting the Bears Ears designation, and when President Biden was elected, he actually called for it to be restored to its original size.

Looking at Utah as a whole, while the state government and its congressional delegation have fought against the Bears Ears designation, there is some reason to believe that the average Utah resident is somewhat in favor of it. In a poll last year conducted by an environmental nonprofit, 71 percent of Utah voters said they support keeping Bears Ears as a national monument. That’s a pretty impressive margin.

5. This will probably be settled in court.

When the Trump administration first took down Bears Ears in 2017, it was sued by a broad coalition of individual plaintiffs. These included several environmental nonprofits, the five tribes that lobbied to create Bears Ears, and Patagonia. Now, these lawsuits were still ongoing when President Biden came into office and reinstated Bears Ears, and they very quickly became controversial. And while not all of those plaintiffs have committed to going back to court, at least some have told us they will. Among others, Earthjustice and Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance told backpacker That they intend to sue.

They argue that the Antiquities Act allows presidents to create national monuments, but not to shrink or repeal them. And legal experts we spoke to said that while reading the text of the law seems to agree, courts have also been fairly deferential to the president’s power in the past, so there’s no telling which way these lawsuits might go.

We’ve been following the changes at Bears Years for a decade, and we don’t plan on stopping anytime soon. If you want to know the latest about what’s happening with America’s national monuments, you can visit Backpacker.com. Until next time, I’m Editor-in-Chief Adam Roy.