By Steve Holland
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Joe Biden will announce on Monday a step toward prohibiting oil and gas development outside the boundaries of a major Native American park in the Southwestern United States as part of a tribal summit he is hosting.
Biden will also announce moves aimed at improving public safety and justice for Native Americans. Representatives from 570 tribes are expected to participate in the event, which is being held virtually because of the pandemic.
Senior administration officials, briefing reporters ahead of the summit, said Biden would announce that the Interior Department in coming weeks, will initiate consideration of protections from new federal oil and gas leasing and development of a 10-mile (16-km) radius around Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico.
The proposed action would not apply to individual Native American allotments or to minerals within the area, the officials said.
Members of New Mexico’s congressional delegation have been pressuring U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland to take steps to ban oil and gas development outside the boundaries of the park, which is listed as a UNESCO world heritage site.
Biden also plans to sign an executive order aimed at improving public safety and criminal justice for Native Americans, the officials said.
The order will direct the Departments of Justice, Interior,
Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services to “create a strategy to improve public safety and justice for Native Americans and to address the epidemic of missing or murdered Indigenous peoples,” according to a White House fact sheet.
Biden and first lady Jill Biden are to address the summit on Monday and Vice President Kamala Harris will make remarks on Tuesday. The tribal summit is the first of its kind since 2016. There were none during the presidency of Republican Donald Trump.
(Reporting by Steve Holland; Editing by Peter Cooney)
