February 24, 2025 — Environmental groups on Wednesday sued President Donald Trump’s administration to overturn an executive order seeking to open Arctic waters off Alaska, as well as waters in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, to oil drilling.
Trump’s Inauguration Day executive order, which revoked protective actions taken by Presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama, violated the federal Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, the plaintiffs argue in their lawsuit.
The law “authorizes the President to withdraw unleased lands of the outer continental shelf from disposition. It does not authorize the President to re-open withdrawn areas to disposition,” said the complaint, which was filed in U.S. District Court in Anchorage and which the plaintiffs said is the first environmental lawsuit filed against the new Trump administration.
A spokesperson for the Department of the Interior declined to comment, citing a policy of avoiding comments on pending litigation.
Trump’s order seeking to open more areas to leasing, which was followed by an order by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum with the same purpose, comes at a time when previous ideas for remote offshore drilling in Alaska appear stalled or fizzled.