October 9, 2019 — Five native, business and environmental organizations sued the Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday over a proposed controversial Alaska gold and copper mine that the Trump administration has backed after it reversed an Obama-era decision that stopped the project due to environmental concerns.
On Tuesday the five groups, representing 31 tribes and tribal governments as well as a seafood development association and hundreds of commercial fishing interests, all sued the EPA in federal court in Anchorage, Alaska, over the administration’s lifting of the Obama EPA 2014 Clean Water Act protections. The Trump administration in late July lifted the Obama EPA’s roadblock on the massive proposed Pebble mine, allowing the project to largely move forward towards the permitting process.
On Wednesday a similar lawsuit was filed against the EPA by more than a dozen other environmental groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council, Defenders of Wildlife, the National Parks Conservation Association and SalmonState. Like the lawsuit filed Tuesday, these environmental groups Wednesday allege the EPA broke the law when it recently withdrew the Obama-era protections that had stopped the mine.