In February 2026, the Trump administration opened a 30-day “Call for Nominations and Comments for the 2026 Coastal Plain Oil and Gas Lease Sale” period during which oil and gas companies were invited to indicate interest in bidding on public lands inside the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska—one of the wildest, most pristine places on Earth.
After years of legal fights, public opposition, and repeated market failures, the Trump administration is once again trying to force drilling into one of the most iconic and ecologically important landscapes in America. It’s the same tired playbook we’ve seen before: rush a lease sale, hope corporations show up, and pretend there’s an economic case that simply doesn’t exist.
Past Arctic Refuge lease sales have drawn almost no serious interest from industry. Major oil companies have stayed away. Investors have backed off. Bids have been sparse and underwhelming. Yet it wouldn’t be out of character for the Trump administration to try and coerce oil and gas companies to lease and drill in the Arctic Refuge just so the administration can claim a win.
As this could be our last opportunity to speak out for protecting the Coastal Plain before the Trump administration puts it up for sale, Wilderness Watch urged members and supporters to speak out, and submitted comments noting the following:
The Arctic Refuge Coastal Plain is too wild and too special to be ruined by oil and gas development.
Oil and gas development on the Coastal Plain will disturb, if not destroy, the calving grounds for the famous migratory Porcupine Caribou Herd, which gathers each year on the Coastal Plain to give birth to their calves. The Indigenous Gwich’in people rely on the Porcupine herd for their subsistence. Other species, such as polar bears, muskox, Dall sheep, and over 100 species of migratory birds will also be impacted.
The 1.56 million-acre Coastal Plain was nominated for formal wilderness designation by the Obama administration in 2015. Under federal regulation and policy, the area must be managed now as if it were designated Wilderness, and no exploration or drilling can be allowed.
All of the Coastal Plain recommended for Wilderness by the Obama Administration must receive “special concern and analysis” by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and be placed off-limits for the upcoming oil and gas lease sale.
A special thank you to over 8,100 of our members and supporters who contacted the BLM during the agency’s “Call for Nominations and Comments for the 2026 Coastal Plain Oil and Gas Lease Sale.”
Read our comments that we submitted with our allies.
Photo: Alexis Bonogofsky
