Public Lands & Waters

A new ultra-luxury golf resort has been playing fast and loose with irrigation rules over in the Shields Valley of Montana. Crazy Mountain Ranch (CMR) was purchased in 2021 by CrossHarbor Capital Partners, the private equity firm that also owns the Yellowstone Club and other upscale retreats that...

In the wake of mounting pressure from both colleagues in Congress and hunters and anglers, Senator Mike Lee announced this evening that he has removed his public land sale provision from the "one, big, beautiful budget bill." "Over the past several weeks, I've spent a lot of time listening to...

Just hours after the Senate parliamentarian shot down the first version of Utah Senator Mike Lee's public land sale bill, Lee submitted a revised edition he hopes will be more amenable to public land advocates and his fellow senators. But it still mandates the sale of hundreds of thousands...

Editor's Note: Since this article was first published, the Senate has amended the original version of this legislation to allow to sale of federal lands under grazing permits. That changed added over 130 million acres to the original total. So, the original estimation we published was 120 million...

Wildfire, workforce reductions, and the timber economy dominated USDA undersecretary nominee and Clearwater Analytics co-founder Michael Boren’s nomination hearing in the Senate Ag committee on June 3. But beyond the hearing room, conversations swirled about the Idaho businessman’s confrontational...

A dispute between two California anglers resulted in a fatality earlier this week. According to a press release from the Monterey County Sheriff's Office, witnesses notified officials of an altercation between two fishermen—Joshua Timothy Holtzclaw and Trenten Paul Black—on the morning of June 11 in...

It’s deja vu all over again. A mere three weeks after hunters, anglers, and conservationists successfully defeated a provision in the U.S. House that would have sold 500,000 acres of public land, an even worse amendment was added to the Senate version of the “one, big, beautiful budget bill...

A mere two weeks after public land advocates successfully blocked a measure that would have sold over 500,000 acres of federal public land, a U.S. senator has vowed to return the provision to the budget reconciliation bill. Utah Senator Mike Lee told Politico’s E&E News yesterday that he wants to...

Update: Due to overwhelming opposition from hunters, anglers, and other public land users, House leadership opted tonight to pull the portion of the budget reconciliation bill that authorized these public land sales. Read more here. Editor's Note: This article originally reported on analysis from...

Republicans in the House Rules Committee opted tonight to pull a provision from the budget reconciliation bill that could have authorized the sale of as many as 500,000 acres of federal public land. The move comes on the heels of overwhelming opposition to the provision from hunters, anglers, and...

While public lands are in the spotlight right now, another federally-funded bureau is quietly facing reductions that could have an impact on anglers and river users. Under new directives from the Trump administration, 25 brick-and-mortar US Geological Survey offices across the country are slated to...

In the midnight hour on May 6, the House Natural Resources Committee passed their portion of the GOP’s “big, beautiful” budget bill, complete with an amendment calling for the sale of what could become tens of thousands of acres of federal lands in Western states. It was the only amendment of over...