The Senate voted to reverse Biden administration drilling restrictions in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, allowing the Trump administration to further open Alaska‘s North Slope to new oil and gas development.
In a 49 to 45 vote, the Senate advanced a resolution of congressional disapproval undoing the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management’s restrictions on oil and gas leasing in the refuge issued late last year.
As the joint resolution passed in the House in mid-November, the measure now goes to President Donald Trump’s desk to be signed into law.
The measure was passed under the Congressional Review Act, a legislative process that allows the majority to bypass a filibuster and vote in a simple majority to undo a regulation.
Republicans have repeatedly used this process throughout this year to undo numerous Biden administration rules and regulations, particularly those meant to phase out fossil fuels or increase environmental protections.
The resolution passed Thursday specifically nullifies a rule issued by BLM in December 2024 related to its record of decision for the agency’s program that leases and develops oil and gas resources in and from the Coastal Plain region within ANWR.
The Biden rule replaced a similar record of decision issued under the first Trump administration, which had made all roughly 1.6 million acres of the Coastal Plain available for oil and gas leasing.
In its broader effort to curb fossil fuel use, the Biden administration dramatically cut the amount of acreage available for leasing, barring oil and gas development on approximately 1.2 million acres.
The 2024 rule did require a minimum of 400,000 acres to be available for oil and gas leasing, which the Biden administration did in an early January auction.
The sale ultimately failed to receive any bids, which the Biden administration and environmentalists said was evidence of the oil and gas industry losing interest in drilling in the Alaska refuge.
State officials and local oil companies rebutted the claim, insisting interest remains. The state even sued the Biden administration over the lease sale, claiming it placed such strict restrictions on surface use, construction, and occupancy that it would have been impossible or impractical for developers to explore and drill.
Congress first authorized drilling in ANWR in 2017, though little movement has been seen since. During his first administration, Trump approved nine lease sales in the region. The Biden administration ultimately suspended seven of these, while two were canceled by bidding companies.
Republicans have claimed that the Biden administration’s increased environmental protections in the region have directly blocked energy production, threatening the state’s economy and broader U.S. energy independence.
Expanding energy production in Alaska has been a top priority for the second Trump administration, as the president aims to boost domestic oil and gas reserves as well as exports abroad.
In addition to boosting production on land in the 49th state, the Department of the Interior has proposed rapidly expanding oil and gas drilling in virtually all of the state’s waters.
Last month, the agency released its five-year management plan for oil and gas development, proposing a lease sale in nearly every planning area off the coast of Alaska, including in the southern Gulf of Alaska, northern Beaufort Sea, and the High Arctic.
Republican Alaska Sens. Dan Sullivan and Lisa Murkowski have broken with the administration and pushed back on this proposal, asking the agency not to drill in Arctic waters.
The two Republican senators are instead asking the administration to focus its attention on the Cook Inlet, the state’s oldest producing oil and gas basin.
HOUSE VOTES TO CANCEL BIDEN DRILLING AND MINING RESTRICTIONS IN ALASKA AND WYOMING
“I appreciate where they’re going with putting everything on the table, but as we have seen with prior five-year lease sales, there have been recommendations that we take certain areas off the table,” Murkowski told E&E News, adding that she fully expected some areas to be taken off the management plan.
“I’m fully expecting that we’re going to be seeing some comments that will weigh in to that effect, and you’re going to see some of these areas taken off,” she added.
