Shrink this national monument in the Mojave Desert? Conservationists are appalled.

When the sun goes down over the Cadiz Dunes, the fading light turns the rippled sand a brilliant orange that glows against a backdrop of jagged mountains and purple sky. These majestic dunes are a central piece of Mojave Trails National Monument, which President Barack Obama established 18 months ago in the heart of the Mojave Desert. But the dunes, along with vast stretches of open desert and mountains around them, could soon be removed from the national monument if President Donald Trump and Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke follow through on a California Republican’s suggestion to eliminate a southern portion of the monument that spreads across about a third of its 1.6 million acres. Rep. Paul Cook presented his proposal in a June 8 letter to Zinke. He argued the monument ended up being much bigger than previously proposed in legislation, and he said having “multiple enclaves of private land” within it would complicate the task of managing the lands. Cook’s letter has left some conservationists alarmed and worried. They question whether an underlying aim is to help the company Cadiz Inc. move ahead with its proposal to pump groundwater on land surrounded by the national monument and sell the water to cities – something that Cook denies is among his reasons...more