Trump Meets an Indigenous Movement

Anaktuvuk Pass, Alaska. Neil Shea photo. In May, Doug Burgum, the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, traveled to the tiny town of Anaktuvuk Pass, Alaska, to announce a new policy: caribou hunters will soon be allowed to use all-terrain vehicles inside the Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve. Under most circumstances this would piss me off—another misguided plan from an administration that seems hell-bent on wrecking environmental protections and green energy initiatives, often for no reason beyond a desire to own the libs or, worse, line the pockets of Trump allies. This sort of anti-life energy is unfolding before us in several parts of the Alaskan Arctic. One example is the so-called Ambler Road project, a 200-mile long mining track that will cut through another roadless wildland near the Kobuk River. I’ve written about the road before and the bullshit reasons given in support of it, while others have detailed how the mining companies behind the road are foreign-owned and…