Does Tina Smith’s Boundary Waters Legislation Change the Outlook?
Yesterday, Senator Tina Smith introduced legislation to protect the Boundary Waters and make permanent the Biden administration’s 20-year moratorium on copper and nickel mining in the Rainy River Watershed. It was a rare spot of welcome news.
Smith’s Boundary Waters Wilderness Protection Act appears to be closely modeled on Representative Betty McCollum’s bill, which is currently wending its slow way through the House.
Both bills set out reasonable positions that appeal to a strong majority of voters. Neither bill is likely to become law anytime soon. As Smith told MPR:
I understand that it will be hard to get this through Congress, given the current political makeup of Congress. But I think it’s important to put a marker out there and give us all something to work towards.
In other words, don’t bet on anything significant happening before 2026 or 2028, or long after that, and bear in mind that any legislation along these lines will face stiff opposition and counter-legislation.
Just a couple of months ago, Representative Pete Stauber reintroduced his Superior National Forest Restoration Act. Despite its name, the bill doesn’t do much to restore Superior National Forest. Stauber aims to undo the Biden moratorium. The only things he’s out to restore are his Chilean patron’s cancelled mineral leases.
So, at best, the 119th Congress is likely to end in a standoff on this issue.
In the meantime, Boundary Waters litigation is still before the DC District Court of Appeals. The last entry in the docket showed Interior Secretary Doug Burgum asking for a 90-day abeyance, during which time, he informs the court, he plans to conduct a farcical exercise in foregone conclusions and hand the Boundary Waters over to the Chilean mining company.
The court still has not answered that 7 March request. It was predicated on what Burgum calls “a meaningful likelihood that the contours of the issues presented in this case will change.” There’s no question about that. Now, however, it appears that they may not change in the direction Burgum and Antofagasta anticipate.
Smith’s legislation sets out a marker, as she says, and Congress, not Trump’s kleptocratic crony, has the greater constitutional authority and should have the ultimate say. This Congress may choose to abdicate its constitutional authority; and confidence placed in politicians is always confidence misplaced. But even the most hardened cynic would have to acknowledge that with Smith’s legislation on the table next to McCollum’s, the long-term outlook has changed a little, and so have the business risks associated with Antofagasta’s approach to its Twin Metals project.
Now there’s a chance — nothing more than that, but a chance all the same — that Antofagasta could see any services Secretary Burgum hastily and corruptly performs on its behalf eventually undone by statute.
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Greg Cocks 
**The Risky Business of Geoengineering**
