Who’s defending Grand Staircase-Escalante?

Slot canyons, petrified forests, and 260 million years of Earth’s history lie exposed in these layered cliffs. On July 13, 2026 a presidential proclamation cut the monument by roughly 90 percent, from 1.87 million acres down to about 181,541 acres, retaining only the Canyons of the Escalante and Kaiparowits Horizon units. About 1.69 million acres reopen to public-land disposal, mineral and geothermal leasing, and mining after a 60-day period. The redrawn boundaries reopen the Kaiparowits Plateau, whose estimated 11.36 billion tons of recoverable coal the monument was created to protect. Conservation groups and the Grand Staircase-Escalante Inter-Tribal Coalition say they were not consulted and are preparing to sue.

1. 1996Designated as national monument
2. 2017Reduced by nearly 50%
3. 2021Boundaries restored
4. 2026Proclamation 11044 cuts monument to ~181,541 acres
5. 2026Excluded lands reopen to mineral leasing and mining (60 days after signing)

No public comment window is open on Grand Staircase-Escalante right now. A call script is ready on the Public Lands Action Network, and the groups above are how the fight gets funded and argued in the meantime.