Conservationists and sportsmen want Congress to reject a White House budget proposal to shift hundreds of millions of dollars dedicated to protecting public lands and waters into a new deferred maintenance program.
The Trump administration’s fiscal 2026 budget request asks lawmakers to divert mandatory spending from part of the Land and Water Conservation Fund to allow agencies to use the money to make infrastructure and maintenance repairs on federal lands. Congress in 2020 approved $900 million in permanent funding for LWCF through the Great American Outdoors Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law during his first term. The popular, ...