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Trump Administration Loses Bid to Dismiss Monument Lawsuits

Associated Press

   SALT LAKE CITY - A federal judge has rejected the Trump
   administration's bid to dismiss lawsuits challenging the
   constitutionality of a 2017 decision to downsize two sprawling national
   monuments in Utah.
   U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan's written decisions issued
   Monday night means the legal challenges seeking to return the Bears
   Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments to their original
   sizes can move forward.
   Chutkan didn't decide the key question at the core of the lawsuits:
   Does the Antiquities Act give presidents the power to create monuments
   as well as reduce them?

   The government has already created new management plans for the
   downsized monuments. President Donald Trump downsized Bears Ears by 85%
   and Grand Staircase by nearly half.

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