Trump’s Reversal of Biden-Era Land Rule Is a Warning to China

L ast week, the Trump administration repealed the Bureau of Land Management’s Conservation and Landscape Health Rule, commonly known as the Public Lands Rule. This regulatory change occurred on the same day that the Senate voted to advance Steve Pearce’s nomination to lead the agency. Pearce, a former Republican congressman from New Mexico, has been vehemently criticized by environmentalists for wanting to privatize and develop public lands and use the proceeds to reduce the national debt.

The BLM administers approximately 244 million surface acres of public land and approximately 713.3 million acres of federal subsurface mineral estate in the United States. In all, the assets under the BLM’s control encompass 30 percent of the nation’s total mineral resources and 10 percent of America’s public land. But the 2024 Biden-era Public Lands Rule effectively kept a third of the nation’s minerals behind legal barriers by elevating “conservation” above historical uses such as energy development, mining, grazing, logging, or recreation. This effectively locked vast portions of U.S. public lands out of the U.S. economy — all to appease left-wing environmentalist activist groups. Worse, compared to private land, the land restricted by the rule was by far the least explored area with the largest potential mineral finds.

Environmentalist critics argue that repealing the Public Lands Rule will place the 245 million acres the BLM manages at risk. However, the agency loses vast amounts of money managing most of its land, according to its official budget justifications. The only land it profitably manages are energy and mineral leases — programs that environmentalists oppose to begin with.

The BLM manages to lose money on most of its land because environmentalists have adopted the practice of suing the agency until it demanded absurd standards. For example, at the music festival Burning Man — which is held on BLM-managed land — environmentalists and bureaucrats have forced a rule dictating that the area must be cleaned to the point where there is no more than one square foot of trash per acre. This is a nonsensical and expensive standard for the festival’s 3,883 acres — an area which, for the festival’s duration, temporarily houses a city of 74,000 people.

That’s just the start of an endless, ever-expanding list of tasks that environmentalists have forced the BLM’s very small budget to address. Small but well-funded activist environmental groups use the threat of endless litigation to strong-arm the agency into adopting their policy preferences without subjecting their radical ideas to democratic debate.

Worryingly, some of these environmentalist BLM pressure groups seem to be receiving money from Communist China. Energy Foundation China (EFC), run by former Chinese government climate officials and with its main operations in Beijing, has bankrolled U.S. environmentalists through grants designed to increase U.S. dependence on Chinese minerals.

This is precisely the kind of tactic the Trump administration’s repeal of the Public Lands Rule aimed to counter by restoring balanced, multiple-use management rather than letting Chinese-funded litigation dictate public policy. Trump’s rule change will end environmental groups’ practice of weaponizing the legal system with the aim of achieving their policy goals in closed-door settlements.

“Sue and settle” practices allow environmental groups to sue federal agencies under statutes like the Endangered Species Act or Clean Air Act, then negotiate settlements that impose new regulations or spending priorities without full public notice, comment periods, or rigorous cost-benefit analyses. This harms Americans by driving up energy costs, restricting land use and development, imposing unfunded mandates on states and businesses, and bypassing democratic accountability, ultimately raising prices for consumers while prioritizing litigation-driven agendas over balanced policy.

China understands that tapping U.S. public lands is vital for America’s grand strategy to contain the People’s Republic. Indeed, the U.S. simply cannot afford to fence off its resource-rich public lands when even the New York Times admits that China is weaponizing its control of global supply chains for the minerals and energy that power 21st-century economies and militaries.

China dominates critical minerals processing, refining 90 percent of key materials like lithium, cobalt, graphite, and rare earths. It uses this leverage for economic coercion, export restrictions, and military-civil fusion, while the U.S. only produces approximately 1 percent of global critical minerals and remains heavily reliant on Chinese imports for 14 of the 33 most vital ones.

U.S. public lands hold enormous untapped potential in critical minerals — resources essential for EVs, semiconductors, and defense systems. The magnets and electronics upon which American military supremacy is built can come from U.S. public lands. By reopening leasing and streamlining development, the Trump administration’s rule repeal accelerates domestic production, builds resilient supply chains, and reduces vulnerability to Beijing’s chokehold.

This isn’t abstract. China’s critical-minerals dominance threatens U.S. manufacturing, tech leadership, and military readiness. Energy dominance from public lands cuts reliance on foreign oil, stabilizes prices, and funds innovation here at home rather than enriching adversaries.

All of this is why President Trump’s new repeal of Biden-era Bureau of Land Management (BLM) environmental rulings is a smart and practical policy that restores balanced management of America’s vast public lands while directly strengthening U.S. economic and national security against China’s dominance in critical resources.