President Trump informed Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) Friday that he will shrink Bears Ears National Monument, a 1.35-million-acre protected area in southeast Utah that is prized by many tribal leaders but opposed by several state and federal Republican officials.
“I’m approving the Bears Ears recommendation for you, Orrin,” Trump told the senator in a phone call Friday morning, according to Hatch’s office, just before Hatch stepped onstage for an event on women in technology in Utah.
In late August, according to documents obtained by The Washington Post, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke recommended paring back the boundaries of Bears Ears and asking Congress to make less-restrictive designations within it, “such as national recreation areas or national conservation areas.” The monument, which contains tens of thousands of cultural artifacts, has become the most prominent symbol of controversy surrounding the Antiquities Act of 1906...