Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument may soon get sweeping rule changes.
Rep. Celeste Maloy and Sen. Mike Lee, both Utah Republicans, are trying a new approach to undo the monument’s 2025 management plan. Their joint resolution, introduced March 4, awaits a congressional vote. If approved, it would roll back the federal rules issued in the final days of the Biden administration that govern the vast southern Utah monument.
The move won’t shrink Grand Staircase’s boundaries — as President Donald Trump did in his first term — but it would change what activities are allowed in which parts of the monument. That could open more land to motorized vehicles and potentially mining and energy development.
All members of Utah’s congressional delegation support the resolution, saying the current plan represents government overreach and does not give residents enough of a voice. By scrapping the Biden-era regulations, Maloy’s statement said, the monument’s 2020 management plan from the first Trump administration would be restored.
Conservation groups say it may not be that simple, though.
It is the first time the Congressional Review Act would be used to change a national monument, said Steve Bloch, legal director with the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. That could create confusion.
“If the resolution would pass, we're really in uncharted waters,” he said. “We count on these management plans to guide how federal agencies and stakeholders interact on the ground with these landscapes, how to behave. And when we undo those plans, it really throws things into chaos.”
That could threaten the fragile landscapes, ecosystems and cultural sites the monument protects, he said — things that don’t recover quickly, if at all, after damage. Representatives from Native tribes have also voiced opposition to Congress rolling back Grand Staircase’s rules, saying it would be an “attack on our ancestral landscape.”
If the resolution succeeds, Bloch said it could also set a precedent that may put other national monuments at risk.
“Americans should be very skeptical when they hear Lee and Maloy suggest that this is just tinkering around the edges,” he said. “This is an assault on the system of federal public lands in the West and across the nation.”
Local leaders near the monument see it differently.
The Kane County Commission approved its own resolution in January in favor of Congress reversing the management plan. Commissioners from Garfield County also support Maloy’s resolution.
The Biden-era rules failed to incorporate perspectives from people who live nearby, said Kane commissioner Celeste Meyeres. In her view, the current regulations are too restrictive to fit with the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976, which allows multiple uses on Bureau of Land Management property. That should not only include recreation, she said, but also some economic activity, like mining and logging.
“We feel like we get a more balanced economy, a more resilient economy, more ability for people to provide for and raise their families with the profession of their choice, when lands are managed for multiple use and sustained yield,” Meyeres said.
A 2026 analysis from independent research group Headwaters Economics showed that Grand Staircase-Escalante and other national monuments boost local economies as visitation increases. But there are downsides to relying on tourism, Meyeres said, and monument regulations often limit other industries.
That’s especially important in Kane County, she said, because so much of it is federal land. A 2024 analysis from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute indicated that 85.5% of Kane is federally owned.
“What happens on the monument really matters to us,” Meyeres said. “So, we applaud this review.”
While questions remain about what the resolution’s passage could bring in the short term, she said local leaders would ultimately prefer to have elected officials decide monument rules, rather than federal agencies.
“There's always uncertainty. I think uncertainty also represents an opportunity,” Meyeres said. “What was published [in the 2025 plan] provided perhaps some certainty, but also was so restrictive that it was not workable. So, we'd rather have an opportunity, even if it includes some risk.”
Conservationists like Bloch, on the other hand, view Maloy and Lee’s actions as part of a broader push to undermine the protection of public lands, pointing to the lawmakers’ previous attempts to sell pieces of federal land in Utah. Those past efforts fizzled after the public raised concerns, he said, so this resolution’s outcome isn’t a done deal.
Survey data, such as the 2026 Conservation in the West poll from Colorado College, indicate broad support for national monuments across the region. A 2024 survey commissioned by the advocacy group Grand Canyon Trust also suggested that a majority of Utahns favor maintaining protections for Grand Staircase-Escalante. Both polls showed support for national monuments extends across party lines.
Bloch expects the House and Senate will vote on the resolution in the next couple of months. In the meantime, his group plans to meet with lawmakers and organize letter-writing and phone-calling campaigns.
“I think Maloy and Lee will learn that Americans stand up and be counted when it comes to places like the Grand Staircase-Escalante,” Bloch said.
Disclosure: The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance is a financial sponsor of KUER
