Following President Trump’s December visit to Utah to shrink the boundaries of the Bears Ears National Monument, tensions have risen sharply between supporters and opponents of President Obama’s 2016 monument designation. Modeled on the success we achieved when I was the mayor of Provo, I came to Congress to take on complex challenges like this and to bring people together to solve difficult problems.
That is precisely why I introduced H.R. 4532, the Shash Jaa National Monument and Indian National Monument Act. It comes as no surprise to me that since introducing my legislation, there has been a lot of misinformation about the bill, as well as some attempts to paint this effort as an attack on local Native Tribes and a destructive plan to open these majestic archeological treasures to oil and gas development.