Last fall, construction commenced on the Velvet-Wood uranium mine in the geologically rich sandstone deposits of San Juan County, Utah, marking a pivotal moment as the first project permitted by the federal government under a controversially expedited "emergency" process. This novel procedure dramatically compresses the environmental review mandated by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to a mere 14 days, a stark contrast to the months, or even years, traditionally required for such comprehensive assessments. Critical to this accelerated timeline, tribal governments received a meager seven days to submit their feedback, while the standard public comment period, a cornerstone of democratic environmental governance, was entirely eliminated, justified by the project’s declared "emergency" status. Historically, both Indigenous nations and the general public benefited from at least 30 days to provide crucial input on projects impacting their lands and communities.

The Velvet-Wood mine’s location in San Juan County is particularly sensitive, situated within a region already profoundly scarred by a long legacy of uranium extraction. This area lies in close proximity to the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe’s ancestral lands, where the community has endured and consistently opposed the adjacent White Mesa Uranium Mill for decades, citing profound environmental and health concerns. During the abbreviated week-long tribal comment period for Velvet-Wood, six distinct Indigenous nations collectively voiced their deep apprehensions to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Their primary concerns revolved around the unprecedented speed of the review process and the significant potential for water contamination stemming from the mine’s operations, a recurrent threat in areas with historical mining activity. Despite these unanimous and grave warnings from sovereign nations, the project proceeded without any substantive alterations.

This expedited approval for the Velvet-Wood mine foreshadowed broader regulatory shifts. Earlier, the Trump administration finalized sweeping changes to NEPA, not only mandating such expedited "emergency" processes but also eliminating long-standing standards for how federal agencies conduct environmental reviews for large-scale projects on public lands. These revisions notably included the removal of standard public comment periods, a move enacted without any meaningful consultation with tribal nations, despite their fervent and unified opposition. NEPA, enacted in 1970, serves as the bedrock of U.S. environmental policy, requiring federal agencies to assess the environmental impacts of proposed actions before making decisions. Its principles of informed decision-making and public participation have influenced similar legislation globally, making these recent rollbacks particularly significant.

In a powerful joint letter, the National Congress of American Indians and the National Association of Tribal Historic Preservation Officers condemned these changes, stating, "The announce-and-defend method of developing federal Indian policy is an inappropriate, paternalistic, unjustified, and historically inefficient method of decision-making." They emphasized that eliminating established standards "ignores federal trust and treaty responsibilities, impinges on roles and sovereignty of Tribal Nations, and flouts longstanding policy and practice by failing to consult with Tribal Nations." The federal government maintains a unique legal and moral obligation to consult with tribal nations on policies and rules that affect them, stemming from treaties, statutes, and executive orders, including Executive Order 13175 on Consultation and Coordination with Indian Tribal Governments. However, critics argue that the previous administration consistently bypassed or accelerated these consultation requirements in pursuit of its "energy dominance" agenda, often at the expense of Indigenous ancestral lands and cultural heritage. These collective changes represent a fundamental shift, significantly diminishing the voice of tribal nations and the public in the management of vast tracts of land across the Western United States.

Agencies operating under the former administration’s directives systematically modified or revoked numerous rules and policies to prioritize resource extraction, frequently invoking a purported "energy emergency" as justification. For instance, the BLM and the U.S. Forest Service rescinded the Public Lands Rule and the Roadless Rule without tribal consultation. Both decisions carry immense implications for Indigenous communities’ ability to safeguard vital natural and cultural resources on public lands, which often extend far beyond reservation boundaries and are integral to their traditional practices and spiritual well-being. Concurrently, efforts were made to "streamline" Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA), a crucial tool tribal nations utilize to ensure government consultation on projects impacting historic properties. Similarly, proposed changes to Section 401 of the Clean Water Act, which empowers tribes to review the environmental impacts of extractive projects within reservation borders before federal permits are issued, further threatened Indigenous environmental oversight.

Gussie Lord, managing attorney at Earthjustice’s Tribal Partnerships Programs, critically assessed the underlying premise: "It’s all predicated on something that isn’t true: We don’t have an energy emergency." Lord warned that eroding public input and tribal consultation will only exacerbate the challenges faced by Indigenous nations, whose cultural and environmental resources are inextricably linked. "The existing laws and regulations that we have are already insufficiently protective of tribal rights and resources," she added, highlighting the precarious position many communities already occupy. The concept of an "energy emergency" has been widely contested by energy experts, who point to robust domestic production and diverse global energy supplies, suggesting the term serves more as a political justification for deregulation than an accurate reflection of market realities.

The previous administration’s changes to the NEPA review process took immediate effect, further sidelining tribal nations from critical decision-making. While the subsequent Biden administration’s Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) embarked on a three-and-a-half-year process to update NEPA implementation regulations, aiming to reincorporate considerations for climate change and environmental justice impacts, the lingering effects of the deregulated standards remain a concern. As NEPA applies to all federal agencies, each must develop its own implementation guidelines. Tribes and legal experts worry that, under the less stringent framework inherited from the prior administration, agencies may lack the imperative to engage meaningfully with Indigenous communities.

Justin Pidot, a University of Arizona professor of law and former general counsel for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, underscored the serious consequences of this regulatory uncertainty. "One is the agencies don’t know how to work together. The second is that there’s litigation risk. The third is that project sponsors don’t know what they’re supposed to do," Pidot explained. The removal of common standards, he noted, "creates lots of complexity for the public, for tribes, for states, for local governments, for nonprofits." Under the Interior Department’s current interim standards, for example, a mining project review might take 28 days, a period that could be slashed to just 14 days with an "emergency" declaration, as seen with the Velvet-Wood mine. This contrasts sharply with previous reviews that could extend up to four years. Pidot lamented, "It substantially limits the degree of information flowing from the federal government to the public about big projects, including to tribes… What is surprising about this particular decision of theirs is that having a common set of rules makes sense for everyone."

In formal comments submitted to the Council on Environmental Quality regarding the deregulation of NEPA standards, numerous tribal nations articulated similar, profound concerns. The Shoshone-Bannock Tribes of Idaho, for instance, highlighted the presence of environmentally hazardous sites on their Fort Hall Reservation, created before modern NEPA protections existed, asserting that stripping away public participation and environmental review provisions "would further entrench long-standing historic inequities that have disadvantaged Tribal communities." The Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of Montana challenged CEQ’s assertion that it did not need to consult with tribes, calling it a "tortured and disingenuous reading of EO 13175," which narrowly focused on economic impacts rather than the full spectrum of environmental consequences. The Susanville Indian Rancheria in California viewed the proposed regulatory removal as "a significant step backward in our nation’s commitment to environmental protection and tribal sovereignty." The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe of South Dakota criticized CEQ for "ignoring its established policy of including indigenous traditional ecological knowledge in environmental reviews under NEPA," arguing that vital considerations like environmental justice, cumulative effects, and climate change were being "arbitrarily cast aside in contravention of explicit statutory language." The Bishop Paiute Tribe of California emphasized that their "traditional and ancestral lands extend far beyond the exterior boundaries of our reservation, and the natural resources on these lands are not merely commodities to be exploited. They are vital to the cultural, spiritual, and economic fabric of all Tribal communities, sustaining traditions that have endured for generations." The Tulalip Tribes of Washington underscored that "the lack of consultation exacerbates the already existing power imbalances, further diminishing the ability of tribes to exercise meaningful sovereignty and protect their interests." The Nez Perce Tribe of Idaho strongly objected to the rule, stating it "eviscerates the framework that has been relied upon since CEQ first issued NEPA regulations in 1978." Finally, the Big Pine Paiute Tribe of California sharply critiqued the interim final rule for sidestepping NEPA, viewing it as endorsing a "personal agenda" that supersedes the rule of law.

Further complicating this landscape are federal budget cuts and mass layoffs that have hampered agencies’ capacity to effectively carry out their work. Simultaneously, congressional budget reductions have impacted funding for critical roles, such as tribal historic preservation officers, who are essential for facilitating government-to-government consultation. Pidot characterized this situation as an attempt to "drown people in an avalanche while providing them with no resources to meet the moment, and call that consultation and collaboration."

In a striking development, as the federal government moved to curtail public and tribal input, it also acquired significant stakes in mining companies, including those behind contentious projects fiercely opposed by some tribal nations and Indigenous communities. Noteworthy examples include the Thacker Pass lithium mine in Nevada and the Ambler Road project in Alaska. This direct financial involvement raises serious questions about potential conflicts of interest. "It’ll be interesting to see if their approval processes for mines in which the federal government has a stake is quicker than it otherwise would have been," Lord observed.

Ultimately, the overarching theme emerging from these policy shifts, according to Pidot, is clear: "The big theme is that anything and anyone that stands in the way of the kinds of projects that this administration wants to do is an obstacle to progress that they’re going to overrun." This aggressive pursuit of resource extraction, particularly uranium, at the expense of established environmental protections and the foundational rights of Indigenous peoples, sets a troubling precedent for land management and federal-tribal relations across the nation.