PALEONTOLOGY AND US NATIONAL MONUMENTS: WHY DOWNSIZING GRAND STAIRCASE ESCALANTE AND BEARS EARS IS BAD FOR SCIENCE

In 2017, US President Trump shrank Grand Staircase-Escalante GSENM) and Bears Ears (BENM) national monuments, both in Utah, by 47% and 85% respectively. These monuments were established under the Antiquities Act to protect paleontological resources, but the Trump administration asserted that the same protection could be provided with smaller boundaries. The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology and other plaintiffs filed suit arguing that presidents lack constitutional authority to rescind protection and (2) that downsizing substantially weakened protection for paleontological sites. National monuments exist to protect specific historic, archaeological, or scientific objects. GSENM was established in 1996 to protect paleontological and geological resources, motivated by discoveries of unique Late Cretaceous mammals. Its original boundaries enclosed units from Permian through Cretaceous, all with “medium” to “high” potential for paleontological resources. Trump’s reductions systematically excluded all of the Permian (including the type section of the Kaibab Fm.) and most of the Triassic and Jurassic sections. More than 700 scientifically important localities were excised, including many of the original Cretaceous mammal sites. BENM was established in 2016 to protect archaeological and Pennsylvanian through Cretaceous paleontological sites. The reduction systematically excluded the Paleozoic units, including important early tetrapod sites, and most of the Triassic sections, some of which were pilfered prior to monument protection. Verifiability is a key feature of the scientific process, and monument status ensured that sites were protected in perpetuity for reinvestigation by new generations of scientists. Despite the Paleontological Resources Preservation Act, sites in the excluded areas have considerably less protection, especially against mineral, oil, and gas extraction, than they did within the original monuments.