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President Donald Trump could eliminate two California national monuments designated by President Joe Biden, according to a new legal opinion from the U.S. Department of Justice. The opinion, released on June 10, reverses a 1938 interpretation and gives presidents broader authority under the Antiquities Act of 1906.
Lanora Pettit, head of the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel, concluded that the Antiquities Act not only allows presidents to designate national monuments but also grants them the power to revoke or reduce such protections. This move could impact millions of acres of federally protected land.
The two California monuments at risk are the Chuckwalla National Monument—covering over 624,000 acres near Joshua Tree—and the Sattitla Highlands National Monument, which spans 224,000 acres around the Medicine Lake volcano. Both areas are culturally significant to Native American tribes and were designated by Biden in January.
Historically, the 1938 opinion by Attorney General Homer Cummings argued that presidents lacked authority to revoke previous monument designations. Pettit’s 50-page opinion now asserts the opposite, stating that the law's silence on revocation implies that the authority exists.
Although past presidents, including Trump, have reduced monument sizes—as seen with Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante in Utah—no president has fully abolished a national monument. Biden later restored those reductions.
The White House has yet to announce if Trump will act on the opinion, but spokesperson Harrison Fields emphasized the administration’s desire to open federal lands to resource extraction, including oil, gas, and minerals.
The potential rollback of monument protections could ignite legal and environmental battles, especially concerning lands of tribal and ecological importance. The opinion marks a major shift in presidential power over public lands and national conservation policy.
