A federal court in Alaska ruled Tuesday the Interior Department must return Arctic oil leases voided by the Biden administration to the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority.
The U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska found that the Biden administration had failed to obtain a court order before canceling seven oil leases AIDEA had purchased in the January 2021 lease sale that the first Trump administration held for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. It ordered Interior to vacate the cancellation.
“The DOI’s error is serious,” Judge Sharon Gleason wrote in the ruling. “DOI cancelled AIDEA’s leases without following the congressionally-mandated procedure for doing so.”
The Biden administration said it had canceled the leases because of legal errors it found in the first Trump administration’s environmental review leading up to the lease sale.
