In a historic decision, President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr has chosen Deb Haaland, a congressional representative from New Mexico and a Native American, to lead the interior department, an agency that for much of the nation’s history played a central role in the dislocation and abuse of Indigenous communities from coast to coast.
Biden’s transition team announced the decision on Thursday. If confirmed by the Senate, Haaland would be the first Native American to lead a cabinet-level agency. She would oversee a sprawling department responsible for some 500 million acres of public lands, including national parks, oil and gas drilling sites and endangered habitat.
Her selection was the latest in a series of high-profile cabinet and White House advisory decisions made in recent days, including Thursday’s choice of Michael S. Regan to run the Environmental Protection Agency.
Like Regan, Haaland would play a major role in implementing Biden’s promised climate change agenda. She would further be responsible for working to strengthen federal protections for vast swathes of territory that the Trump administration has opened up to drilling, mining, logging and construction.
Historians and tribal leaders said that her selection represented a watershed moment in the US’s scarred history with its native people.
New York Times News Service
