While New Mexico is struggling against inflation, an open southern border and a flat economy, our rural communities have an additional fight on their hands. An aggressive overreach of the Federal Government threatens to undermine local communities.
The media has under-reported the federal government’s recent surge of land grabs, which are part of the Biden Administration’s “America the Beautiful Act.” The act is more commonly referred to as the “30x30” initiative, because it is designed to give the federal government ownership over 30-percent of the nation’s land and water by 2030.
The plan will turn one-third of our “One Nation Under God” into a nature preserve. The land grabs come in the form of monument designations, wildlife refuges, and conservation projects. They increasingly come in the form of land easements, where farmers and ranchers are enticed to take one-time payments for tracts of their lands that the government or interest groups it funds take control of the lands forever. These arrangements can even eliminate the ability of landowners to use their own land for farming, ranching, fishing and other activities.
Taking New Mexico Land
The latest target of the 30x30 program is the massive Muleshoe Wildlife Refuge Expansion, a plan underway to designate seven-million acres in Texas and New Mexico as federal land. The expansion circumvents Congress, every local government, and nearly every private property owner, all of whom have been left out of the process. It also fails to consider the economic impacts that will be imposed on our rural communities and families.
The expansion includes easements that will be applied to as much as 700,000 acres of land inside the Muleshoe area. The lands under the new easements will be crippled economically, and will fall under strict restrictions relating to private use and even public access.
The Muleshoe expansion will have devastating consequences. It will eliminate a portion of every local community tax base, reduce oil and mineral production in our state, and cheat private property owners out of future economic opportunities on the lands they have lived and worked on–in some cases for generations.
This new addition to the 30x30 program is an assault on our rural way of life, including our ability to grow food and manage our properties. The fact is, when government controls our land, it controls a critical piece of our freedom and erodes the American Dream.
New Mexicans Should Take Action
It is critical for New Mexicans to support local and county resolutions that are opposing this new land grab. The four affected counties in New Mexico should join the 14 affected counties in Texas to become ground-zero in the stand against the federal government’s expanding 30x30 program.
Today’s Muleshoe expansion may become an expansion into your community. We must stand united, educate our neighbors, and support our local and county governments as they oppose this unprecedented new expansion.
Make Your Voice Heard on July 25
Please join Texas AG Commissioner, Sid Miller, American Stewards of Liberty and elected officials from Texas and New Mexico at 7:00 pm on July 25 in Littlefield, TX at the Lamb County Ag Building to learn how you can help protect our rural way of life.
Yvette Herrell is a former U.S. Representative from New Mexico and a candidate for Congress.