Tracking every rollback, reversal, and overreach — and the path back to the America we know.
President Trump signed Proclamation 2018-12259 on May 31, 2018, designating June 2018 as National Ocean Month. The proclamation directs federal attention to ocean conservation, marine resources, and coastal economies. The proclamation has no direct regulatory effect on Americans but formally recognizes ocean stewardship as a national priority for the designated month.
President Trump signed Proclamation 2018-12033 on May 30, 2018, designating June 2018 as Great Outdoors Month. The proclamation encourages Americans to spend time in national parks, forests, and public lands, and recognizes outdoor recreation as part of American heritage. The proclamation is ceremonial and establishes a monthlong observance with no direct regulatory or budgetary impact on Americans.
President Trump signed Proclamation 2018-08822 on April 20, 2018, designating National Park Week in the United States. The proclamation calls for celebration and recognition of the nation's parks during the specified week. The proclamation has no direct regulatory or budgetary impact on Americans but serves as an official recognition of the National Park System.
On April 12, 2018, President Trump signed a memorandum directing federal agencies to review and modify procedures for implementing air quality standards under the Clean Air Act. The memorandum instructed agencies to consider economic impacts and domestic manufacturing competitiveness when implementing air quality regulations. The confirmed effect was to initiate a regulatory review process that extended timelines for certain air quality compliance measures and modified how federal agencies weighed environmental standards against economic factors.
President Trump issued executive orders drastically reducing protections on Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears national monuments in Utah, cutting nearly 3 million acres—over 90% of each monument's protected area. Grand Staircase-Escalante lost 1.7 of its 1.87 million acres while Bears Ears was reduced from 1.36 million to 121,000 acres. The reductions open vast tracts of public land to mining, drilling, and development while eliminating environmental and cultural protections.
On December 4, 2017, President Trump signed Proclamation 2017-26709, reducing Bears Ears National Monument in Utah from 1.35 million acres to approximately 228,775 acres. The proclamation eliminated protections on roughly 1.1 million acres of public land previously designated as monument. The reduction removed federal protections from lands containing archaeological sites, natural resources, and ecosystems, allowing potential future resource extraction and development on the removed acreage.
Executive Order 13807 was signed on August 15, 2017, establishing procedures to streamline environmental review and permitting timelines for infrastructure projects to a maximum of 2 years for major projects. The order reduced the default review period from 10 years to 2 years and removed certain environmental review requirements. The confirmed direct impact includes faster permitting for highways, pipelines, bridges, and water projects, with expedited reviews applied to hundreds of infrastructure permits filed after the order's effective date.
President Trump signed Proclamation 2017-11774 on May 31, 2017, designating June 2017 as Great Outdoors Month. The proclamation encourages Americans to visit and enjoy federal public lands and waters. The proclamation has no regulatory effect and does not change access to or management of federal lands.
Executive Order 13795, signed April 28, 2017, revoked the previous administration's offshore drilling moratoriums and directed the Department of Interior to review and open federal waters to oil and gas leasing. The order eliminated restrictions on energy development in U.S. coastal waters, including the Atlantic, Pacific, and Arctic oceans. The direct effect was the expansion of federal lease sales for oil and gas extraction in previously protected marine areas.
Executive Order 13792 was signed on April 26, 2017, directing the Secretary of the Interior to review all national monument designations made since January 1, 1996, and report on their legality and appropriateness. The order resulted in the Interior Department recommending changes to multiple monument designations, leading to the subsequent reduction in size of Bears Ears National Monument (Utah) and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument (Utah), which removed federal protections from approximately 2 million acres of public land.