{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://begich.house.gov/media/press-releases/delegation-hails-aideas-coastal-plain-court-victory", "Delegation Hails AIDEA\u2019s Coastal Plain Court Victory", "2025-03-26", "2025", "2025-03", "Republican", "House", "AK", "Nicholas J. Begich III", "B001323", "begich.house.gov", "begich", "https://begich.house.gov/media/press-releases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 March 26, 2025 \u2013 U.S. Senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan, and Representative Nick Begich, (all R-Alaska) today issued the following statements after the U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska ruled that the Biden administration illegally canceled seven leases in the non-wilderness Coastal Plain of ANWR in 2023. The leases were bid on, won, and held by the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority (AIDEA), which filed the successful court challenge.\n\n\u201cAs we wrote the Coastal Plain program in 2017, we adopted a legal framework substantially similar to the one in place for the NPR-A. After the first Trump administration developed a good program and AIDEA secured seven leases, the Biden administration spent four years attempting to turn the program on its head. From their initial pause and then the cancelation of these leases, to the arbitrary closure of 74 percent of the program area and a lease sale that was designed to fail, I can\u2019t think of a single lawful thing the last administration did on the Coastal Plain,\u201d Senator Murkowski said. \u201cWhile we lost years of development to their willful intransigence, this decision is an important step to getting things back on track. I appreciate Judge Gleason\u2019s clear-eyed reading of the law we wrote and congratulate AIDEA on their victory. I hope their leases are immediately reinstated and thank them for persevering in their effort to help develop our state\u2019s abundant resources for the benefit of all Alaskans.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve said for years that not only were President Biden\u2019s 70 executive orders and actions shutting down Alaska harmful to our state and working families, but many of them were also illegal,\u201d said Senator Dan Sullivan. \u201cThe District Court ruled yesterday that the administration\u2019s cancellation of ANWR leases was a \u2018serious\u2019 error that violated \u2018congressionally mandated procedures.\u2019 That is an important rebuke, but I don\u2019t believe that this was an honest mistake. President Biden\u2019s lawyers likely knew this cancellation was illegal, but they did it anyway in order to have a chilling impact on future Coastal Plain lease sales and to kill hundreds, if not thousands of jobs for Alaskans. But it is a new day for our state. We now have an administration that is committed to unleashing our extraordinary resources, growing our economy and creating good-paying jobs for hardworking Alaskans.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe Biden Administration\u2019s illegal cancellation of leases in ANWR was a reckless act of overreach that hurt Alaska families and threatened America\u2019s path to energy security,\u201d said Congressman Begich. \u201cThe law could not be more clear: the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, passed by Congress in 2017 and signed into law by President Trump mandates the responsible development of ANWR. This ruling brings us one step closer to restoring the promise of ANWR and putting Alaska back on the map as a cornerstone of America\u2019s energy dominance.\u201d\n\nIn September 2023, the Department of the Interior canceled all seven of AIDEA\u2019s leases on the Coastal Plain. AIDEA sued the Department the following month. In her opinion finding for AIDEA, U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason wrote that, \u201cFederal Defendants\u2019 cancellation of AIDEA\u2019s leases was not in accordance with law because it failed to seek a court order\u2026The Court finds that vacatur is appropriate. DOI\u2019s error is serious: DOI cancelled AIDEA\u2019s leases without following the congressionally-mandated procedure for doing so\u2026 DOI\u2019s Lease Cancellation Decision of AIDEA\u2019s ANWR leases is VACATED.\u201d\n\nJudge Gleason has sent the matter back to the Department of the Interior for further action.\n\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-07T00:15:27Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://begich.house.gov/media/press-releases/delegation-hails-aideas-coastal-plain-court-victory"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.8096350356936455, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}