‘Raise the stakes of this fight’
Sporting a Western shirt and jeans, New Mexico’s senior congressional member didn’t mince words as he addressed 150-200 people gathered at the Slide Trailhead on the edge of the Rio Pueblo de Taos Gorge Saturday (June 7).
“We could lose this one,” U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich told the crowd, referring to President Donald Trump's so-called "One Big Beautiful Bill" and the impacts the legislation, if signed into law, could have on public lands like the Rio Grande del Norte National Monument. The monument encompasses the Rio Grande Gorge and a total of 245,000 acres of land from Pilar to the New Mexico–Colorado border.
Heinrich was the lead speaker at the rally, one of two held in New Mexico for Saturday’s nationwide “day of action” to raise awareness of what organizers said is an existential threat to public land posed by the Donald Trump presidential administration and a Republican-controlled Congress.
But, Heinrich added, “We could also raise our voices so loud, that for fear of losing the reconciliation bill, Republican leadership actually keeps the public land provisions out.”
The event was hosted by Friends of the Rio Grande del Norte National Monument, a local nonprofit environmental group, in defense of public lands in New Mexico and around the country. A similar event was held Saturday at Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument outside Las Cruces.
According to a press release from NM Wild, reporting by the Washington Post earlier this year showed three of New Mexico's national monuments — Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks, Rio Grande del Norte, and Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks — are on the Trump administration's shortlist for potential boundary reductions and resource extraction.
Although the Rio Grande del Norte, which was established by presidential proclamation in 2013, was not actually mentioned in the reporting, a February U.S. Department of Interior memo titled "Unleashing American Energy" instructs the department to prioritize natural resource development on "all withdrawn public lands," which includes all national monuments across the country.
Nick Streit, executive director of Friends of the Rio Grande del Norte National Monument and owner of Taos Fly Shop, said in the release that the consequences of such actions would be far reaching.
“Without safeguarded public access to the river, our livelihood — and in fact our entire way of life — would be in jeopardy,” he said. “If national monuments are abolished, businesses like mine could disappear and the rural economies that depend on them will suffer.”
Heinrich confirmed that national monuments and other public land is on the chopping block during this month’s Congressional budget reconciliation process.
“We could lose millions of acres of public land around the West,” he said, urging the crowd to take action.
“We’ve got to do everything we can in the next few weeks to raise the stakes of this fight,” he said. “But I will tell you, as long as I draw breath, I’m going to keep this fight up. Our public lands are central to who we are as New Mexicans, and even if we lose a few battles along the way, we will not lose the war.”
On a hike down the Slide Trail, Heinrich told the Taos News that the Republican effort to roll back public land protections is serious and imminent.
“I think it’s [going to be] fast,” he said. “The Senate Republican leadership wants to pass a reconciliation bill before July.”