Washington, D.C. — In response to Secretary Bernhardt’s extensions of Kate MacGregor’s term as acting deputy Interior secretary and William Perry Pendley’s term as acting director of the Bureau of Land Management, the League of Conservation Voters (LCV) released the following statement from Legislative Representative Laura Forero:

“Secretary Bernhardt is continuing the culture of corruption at the Interior Department with the reappointments of Kate MacGregor as acting deputy Interior secretary and William Perry Pendley as acting director of the Bureau of Land Management. Both MacGregor and Pendley have a history of listening to polluters, not the American people — they are completely unfit for leadership roles with the agency responsible for our precious public lands and natural resources.

“During her time at DOI, MacGregor has personally intervened to fast track permits for politically connected oil and gas companies and overseen unprecedented rollbacks of public lands and health protections. Pendley has spent his entire career advocating against protections for our public lands, supports radical ideas like selling off large swaths of public lands, attempted to open lands surrounding the Grand Canyon to new uranium mining, and led the charge to relocate the BLM. We are in a nature and climate crisis and we cannot afford these anti-environment extremists at the helm of DOI.”

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