SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A federal judge is denying the U.S. government’s request to move lawsuits challenging President Donald Trump’s downsizing of two Utah national monuments to Salt Lake City.
U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan said Monday the lawsuits will stay in a federal court in Washington, D.C. She also ordered the government to give two days of notice to the conservation, tribal and paleontological groups who sued before any ground disturbances occur within the boundaries of the original monuments.
Justice Department officials didn’t immediately have comment. The agency’s lawyers argued that interest in the cases in Utah outweighed the decision by the groups to sue in Washington.
Chutkan didn’t elaborate in the written orders why she made her decision.
Trump downsized the Bears Ears National Monument by about 85 percent and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by nearly half.
