President Trump signed an executive order overlooked by some in the media on his first day of office that experts tell Fox News Digital will play a critical role in developing mineral resources in the United States.
On the first day of his presidency, Trump signed an executive order advancing the Ambler Access Project, a 211-mile industrial road through the Brooks Range foothills that enables commercial mining for copper, zinc and other materials in a remote Arctic area in Northwest Alaska.
That executive order, one of dozens signed by Trump in the early hours of his administration, reverses a move by former President Biden to block the project and represents a significant change in energy policy, according to experts who spoke to Fox News Digital.
“President Biden issued 70 executive actions that discouraged tapping into Alaska’s natural resources and public lands access,” Gabriella Hoffman, Independent Women’s Forum Center for Energy & Conservation Director, told Fox News Digital. “Unlike his predecessor, President Trump recognizes Alaska’s potential to meet domestic energy and national security needs for reliable energy and critical minerals—including restoring the Ambler Access Project connecting to the Ambler Mining District.”
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President Donald Trump, left, and the Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, Alaska, right (Getty )
“The Ambler Access Project has endured extensive environmental review and would bring economic development to rural communities in dire need of it without despoiling Alaska’s natural beauty,” Hoffman added. “”Those who would benefit from employment by Ambler also hunt, fish, and enjoy public lands.”
Research by the University of Alaska Center for Economic Development on the economic impact of the project concluded that the development of the Ambler Mining District could create thousands of direct, indirect, and induced jobs and the project could mean a projected $1 billion for the state in revenue, mining license tax revenue, corporate income taxes, and production royalties.
“Ambler Road is the equivalent of a shoe lace on a football field: a blip in the vast remoteness of Alaska’s wilderness,” Power The Future founder and Executive Director Daniel Turner told Fox News Digital, “Yet somehow bureaucrats in DC who do not live there and cannot find it on a map have the authority to prevent Alaskans from developing their own land and growing their economy. It’s insanity.”
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U.S. President Donald Trump talks to reporters from the Resolute Desk (Getty Images)
Unlocking the project comes under the backdrop of China’s emergence in the market for critical minerals as the country controls roughly 60% of the world’s production of rare earth minerals and materials prompting warnings from U.S. officials on the over-reliance on foreign suppliers.
Turner explained that projects like Ambler Road being held up by the Biden administration have increased US dependency on China.
“Critical projects in Alaska like Ambler Road and Pebble Mine and oil and gas exploration in ANWR which are held up by radical green ideologues have forced our dependency on China for these raw materials, compromised our national security, but also prevented our fellow Americans in Alaska from the prosperity and economic opportunities they deserve,” Turner said.
“So many raw materials we need are in Alaska, and Governor Dunleavy is hamstrung by green insanity in San Francisco and Washington, DC from developing them and growing his state’s prosperity. The Trump Administration could be the most pro-Alaskan Presidency since Lincoln bought it.”
Hoffman told Fox News Digital that “critics” of the Ambler project “ignore” is that “access to the Ambler Mining District is guaranteed by the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA) of 1980.”
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Sunset Inside Passage near Sitka, Alaska, Inside Passage. (Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
“My fellow Lower-48ers treat Alaska as a national preserve to be untouched and unexplored–dismissing locals and their perspectives,” Hoffman said. “President Trump is actually listening to Alaskans and their needs.”
In a statement to Fox News Digital, Alaska GOP Sen. Dan Sullivan said he looks forward to “working with President Trump’s administration and Alaskan leaders in the region to fully implement President Trump’s Alaska-specific EO, which includes reversing Biden’s denial of the Ambler road.”
“After enduring a four-year onslaught of 70 executive orders and actions by the Biden administration targeting my state, Alaskans have a new sense of hope and optimism for our future across a whole host of sectors and projects, including in our ability to develop our vast deposits of critical minerals and metals—many of which the United States is almost wholly dependent on China for,” Sullivan said.
Sullivan added that he worked “closely” with the first Trump administration to approve a road to the Ambler Mining District before the Biden administration “issued an order that killed that road last June, even though federal law mandates it.”
“Ironically, during Joe Biden’s final overseas trip as president, he announced $600 million in aid to build a railroad in Angola to help that country produce and market its critical minerals. That’s insane.”
Trump also signed an executive order which he said will “unleash American energy” by directing agencies to revise and rescind actions that impose undue burdens on domestic mining.
“The Trump Administration is unwavering in its commitment to securing America’s energy future, strengthening national defense, and fostering economic growth,” White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly told Fox News Digital.
“By unlocking one the world’s largest undeveloped mineral belts, President Trump is ensuring a domestic supply of critical minerals, reducing our reliance on foreign adversaries, and creating thousands of American jobs. This project is a win for national security and the American people.”
Andrew Mark Miller is a reporter at Fox News. Find him on Twitter @andymarkmiller and email tips to [email protected].
