Alaska sues feds over polluted lands governor says DC 'knowingly' transferred to Natives

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PALMER, Alaska – The State of Alaska recently filed a court action against the Biden administration alleging the federal government has failed to act on contractual obligations to clean up knowingly polluted sites affecting Alaskan Native populations.

The suit names Interior Secretary Debra Haaland, the Interior Department and the sub-departmental Bureau of Land Management, claiming they've failed to clean up millions of acres of land transferred from the federal government to Alaskan Natives through the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of the 1970s.

Unlike Native Americans in the Lower 48, most Alaskan Natives do not live on federal reservations, but instead on land they own through ANCSA — except for only the Metlakatla reservation near Ketchikan.

More than 650 parcels were contaminated by arsenic, asbestos, lead, mercury and other substances before their property rights were transferred, Alaska Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy told Fox News Digital while discussing the July complaint in a recent interview.

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Alaska Gov. Michael Dunleavy speaks during CPAC in Orlando (Tristan Wheelock/Bloomberg via Getty)

Dunleavy said Haaland and the Interior Department are contractually obligated to clean up these lands, criticizing their inaction in the face of the Biden administration's sweeping focus on environmentalism and the green agenda.

The governor claimed the administration only likes to highlight Native American populations when it helps their politics.

"They knowingly transferred lands that were polluted to the Natives. They knew the wells were there, and they knew there was pollution," he said of the federal government's original action in 1971.

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The full moon disappears from view in Soldotna, Alaska, as it sets Wednesday, Nov. 28, 2012, behind peaks in the Alaska Range shortly before sunrise. (AP Photo/Peninsula Clarion, M. Scott Moon)

"The thing is, what's interesting about all that is [the Biden] administration will use Native Alaskans when it is to their benefit. But then they forget about them when it's not," citing other projects either halted or at a relative standstill like the King Cove Road or drilling in the Section 1002 Area of Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR).

In the case of King Cove, locals have wanted to build a gravel road from the relatively remote southwestern community through the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge to nearby Cold Bay — where access to a jet-sized runway they say will guarantee better access to emergency medical care, among other benefits.

The governor told Fox News that Alaskan Natives living near ANWR overwhelmingly support Trump-era actions to allow drilling on that land — and oppose President Biden's suspension thereof.

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Interior Secretary Deb Haaland speaks during a press briefing at the White House. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Dunleavy said the polluted lands suit is not in the form of one single court claim, but that the plaintiffs made a filing for each identified site, calling it another example of a flaw in the White House's green platform.

"Many moves that they do in Alaska totally fly in the face of their concept of saving the environment," he said. 

"When you push [resource production] overseas, whether it's timber, whether it's oil, whether it's gas or whether it's mining, you're accepting the fact that mining and those other activities will take place under much lower standards than Alaska and the United States" have.

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"The part I think they and the extreme environmentalists never get called out on is it's not about the environment. For some reason, I think the purpose is just to weaken the state and weaken the country, to be honest with you," Dunleavy said.

The Interior Department declined comment on the court action.