by Mark Chesnut - Monday, July 14, 2025
A new executive order signed by President Donald Trump will establish a commission to prioritize expanding public land access for hunting and encourage wildlife conservation efforts through proactive, voluntary on-the-ground collaborative efforts. President Trump signed the executive order on July 3 establishing the Make America Beautiful Again (MABA) Commission.
“Years of mismanagement, regulatory overreach, and neglect of routine maintenance require action,” the order stated. “Land-use restrictions have stripped hunters, fishers, hikers and outdoorsmen of access to public lands that belong to them. These bureaucratic restrictions have undermined outdoor traditions and threatened conservation funding.”
The Trump administration sees the matter differently than many previous administrations and understands the importance of public lands to hunters and other outdoor recreationalists.
“The United States is blessed with vast beautiful landscapes, abundant natural resources and a rich heritage of discovery by travelers and outdoorsmen,” the order further stated. “America’s national parks, forests, waterways and public lands have inspired generations and kindled our Nation’s spirit of exploration. To ensure that the next generation of Americans inherits this same sense of duty and adventure, my administration will prioritize conserving our great American national parks and outdoor recreation areas.”
Over the past four years, sportsmen and women witnessed the Biden administration’s repeated attempts to limit Americans’ access to hunt and shoot on our federal lands.
While Biden’s U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) announced a continuation of policies initiated under the first Trump administration to expand opportunities on national wildlife refuges, the expansion came with a catch in the form of phasing out the use of traditional lead ammunition.
After fighting the Biden Administration on this issue for years, the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA) welcomed the establishment of the MABA Commission.
“President Trump’s Executive Order continues his commitment to hunters, outdoorsmen and all that enjoy our nation’s vast outdoor recreation opportunities and resources,” NRA-ILA said in a news alert. “Recall that President Trump signed into law the Great American Outdoors Act in August 2020, one the nation’s most significant actions to preserve American wildlife and hunting heritage in decades. The act provides critical federal funding to address the decaying infrastructure on U.S. public lands and waters as well as opportunities for increased access to public hunting and recreational shooting on millions of acres of federally managed lands.”
Under the new Trump executive order, all federal land management agencies must, to the extent practicable, ensure that their policies promote responsible stewardship of natural resources while driving economic growth, expand access to public lands and waters for recreation, hunting and fishing, and encourage responsible, voluntary conservation efforts. They must also cut bureaucratic delays that hinder effective environmental management and recover America’s fish and wildlife populations through proactive, voluntary, on-the-ground collaborative conservation efforts.
The commission will be chaired by U.S. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, with the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy serving as executive director. Members will include the Secretary of Defense, Secretary of Agriculture and other Trump administration officials. The commission’s focus will be on conserving America’s national treasures and natural resources, facilitating interagency coordination on conservation efforts, developing policies to recover fish and wildlife populations through collaboration over regulation and including state wildlife agencies in those efforts. It will also advise and assist the president regarding how best to responsibly conserve America’s national treasures and natural resources, including by “developing policies to expand access to public lands, national parks, national forests, and wildlife refuges while promoting a wide range of outdoor recreation opportunities like hunting, fishing, hiking, biking, skiing, climbing, boating, off-roading, and wildlife viewing.”
The executive order comes just a week after a secretarial order by Burgum to begin implementation of key provisions of the Expanding Public Lands Outdoor Recreation Experiences passed and signed into law last year. That order designated leadership responsibilities, established coordination mechanisms and ensured timeline compliance with all statutory deadlines to expand outdoor recreation opportunities on U.S. public lands and waters.
About the Author
Freelance writer and editor Mark Chesnut is the owner/editorial director at Red Setter Communications LLC in Jenks, Okla. An avid hunter, shooter and field-trialer, he has been covering Second Amendment issues and politics on a near-daily basis for over 25 years.