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    Revealed: Trump officials rush to mine desert haven native tribes consider holy

    Since January, San Carlos Apache tribal member Wendsler Nosie Sr has been sleeping in a teepee at a campground in south-eastern Arizona’s Oak Flat, a sprawling high desert oasis filled with groves of ancient oaks and towering rock spires.
    It is a protest in defense of “holy ground” where the Apache have prayed and performed ceremonies for centuries.
    A dozen south-western Native American tribes have strong cultural ties to Oak Flat. But the Trump administration, in its waning days, has embarked on a rushed effort to transfer ownership of the area to a mining company with ties to the destruction of an Aboriginal site in Australia, the Guardian has learned.
    “We were in the fourth quarter with two minutes left in the game. And then Trump cheated so now we only have one minute left,” said Nosie, who was a football quarterback in high school. “Everybody has to mobilize now to fight this.” More

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    'The Democratic party left us': how rural Minnesota is making the switch to Trump

    Ask Larry Cuffe why, after decades of voting for Democrats, he voted for Donald Trump four years ago, and he’ll talk about his distrust of Hillary Clinton and the need to get northern Minnesota’s mines back to work.Ask the former police officer why he’s sticking with Trump in 2020 and the list is very much longer.“The Democratic party left us. Even in the past four years it’s changed so much. Supporting people who riot? Defunding the police? That’s crazy. I think a lot of us up here are Democrats in Republican clothing now,” he said.Cuffe, who twice voted for Barack Obama, is one of six mayors from a stretch of Minnesota mining country, known as the Iron Range, who turned their back on the Democratic party and signed a joint letter endorsing Trump even as the state is swinging behind the president’s opponent, Joe BidenThe mayors said that after decades of voting for Democrats, they no longer regarded the party as advocating for workers.“Lifelong politicians like Joe Biden are out of touch with the working class, out of touch with what the country needs, and out of touch with those of us here on the Iron Range and in small towns like ours across our nation,” they said. More

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    Trump administration drafts pact for mining on the moon

    The US-sponsored international Artemis Accords has not been shared, but proposes ‘safety zones’ around future moon bases An illustration by Nasa shows Artemis astronauts on the moon. Photograph: AP The Trump administration is drafting a legal blueprint for mining on the moon under a new US-sponsored international agreement called the Artemis Accords, according to people […] More

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    Trump seizes on pandemic to speed up opening of public lands to industry

    The Trump administration has ratcheted up its efforts amid the coronavirus pandemic to overhaul and overturn Obama-era environmental regulations and increase industry access to public lands. The secretary of the interior, David Bernhardt, has sped efforts to drill, mine and cut timber on fragile western landscapes. Meanwhile, the EPA, headed by the former coal lobbyist […] More

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    Trump finalizes plans to open Utah monuments for mining and drilling

    Lawsuits are pending from groups who have challenged the constitutionality of shrinking Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante Plans finalized on Thursday for two national monuments in Utah downsized by Donald Trump would ensure that lands previously off-limits to energy development will be open to mining and drilling. The move comes despite pending lawsuits from conservation, […] More