For Immediate Release - March 21, 2025
Fairbanks, AK – Yesterday, Secretary Burgum announced the Department of the Interior’s intentions to open the entire sacred coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development. Secretary Burgum’s intentions to pilfer sacred land in the Arctic Refuge to the highest bidder flies in the face of the rights of the Gwich’in as Indigenous people and, quite frankly, in the face of common sense. The 2017 Arctic Refuge leasing program has been a massive failure on all accounts. Yesterday’s announcement makes clear, yet again, that this administration favors corporations over people.
The Gwich’in Steering committee stands alongside our Tribal leadership in reiterating our opposition to ANY oil and gas development on the sacred lands of the Arctic Refuge, and will continue to call for permanent protection of the Porcupine Caribou Herd’s calving grounds in the coastal plain. This has been the position of the Gwich'in Nation since the threat of oil and gas in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge emerged in the 1980's and remains our position today. And we know that we are not alone: the majority of Americans oppose drilling in the Arctic Refuge and the United Nations has three times sounded alarms about the harm and human rights violations to the Gwich’in from any oil and gas development in the calving grounds of the Porcupine caribou herd.
“Our Gwich’in people have relied on these lands and waters just as the Porcupine caribou herd have for thousands of years, and any threats to the caribou are a direct threat to our way of life,” said Kristen Moreland, executive director of the Gwich’in Steering Committee. “We will continue to fiercely defend Iizhik Gwats'an Gwandaii Goodlit from any threats from oil and gas development, period. Our Gwich’in people stand side by side with all Alaska Native communities and our allies that are opposed to extractive and destructive industry on sacred land. We will fight this.”
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For Media Inquiries:
Genae Lako, 303-918-6290
Kristen Moreland, Executive Director, 907-328-9634
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