Ferguson: Trump Can't Revoke National Monument Status

SEATTLE, WA - Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson is taking on President Donald Trump's administration over the proposed shrinking of national monument sites. The move is intended to open up mining and drilling sites. Ferguson sent a letter to U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke criticizing the administration's review of national monuments in the western part of the country.

“I ask President Trump and Secretary Zinke to respect the legal limits of their powers,” Ferguson said in a statement. “If President Trump attempts to harm Washington’s national monuments, my office will defend them.”

This isn't the first time Ferguson has challenged Trump. He successfully sued the administration over the immigration ban earlier this year. The ban has since then been partly reinstated.

The specifics of the Trump administration's national monument plan aren't clear yet. But Ferguson said that any attempt to revoke national monuments is illegal per the Antiquities Act of 1906.

"...the act does not contemplate any such revocation, and to do so would be contrary to the language of the statute and the structure in which the law delegates Congress’s constitutional authority," Ferguson said.

The list of sites to be reviewed includes Washington's Hanford Reach National Monument, designated in 2000.

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