Trump administration's cuts to 2 Utah national monuments, explained ⁠45%

By Emery Winter⁠9%

7/21/2026, 6:00:11 AM

BS Summary: This article contains 32 faulty reasoning types, including Unattributed Quote, Appeal to Authority, and Biased Writer Voice, with Negativity Bias as the most egregious example at 31.9% saturation with 203 hits. Analysis detected 1,691 faulty-reasoning hits from 636 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 47.9% and a BS Rank of ⁠45% (11,346 of 20,496 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 55.40% of the article peer group.

In July 2026, social media users claimed U.S. 
President Donald Trump was cutting 3 million acres of national monuments in Utah. 
National monuments are significant lands or waters set aside for permanent protection. 
For example, one X post (archived) said Trump announced "that he is terminating 3 million acres of national monuments, opening them up to drilling, mining, and industrial development." 
The claim also spread on Facebook (archived), Instagram (archived) and Threads (archived), where users noted the national monuments affected are located in Utah, while numerous readers searched our site for more information and emailed us asking if the claim is true. 
On July 13, 2026, Trump did issue a pair of proclamations that would reduce the size of two national monuments in Utah — Bears Ears National Monument and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument — by a total of roughly 2.9 million acres between them. 
Therefore, we've rated this claim true. 
Trump administration's 2026 cuts 
Between a fact sheet Trump's White House released and the two proclamations that accompanied it, the Trump administration described how much land is being removed from each monument. 
Bears Ears is set to be cut from 1.36 million acres to approximately 121,100 acres, while Grand Staircase-Escalante would reduce from 1.87 million acres to approximately 181,500 acres. 
Bears Ears National Monument is named after a pair of buttes in southeastern Utah that look like a pair of bear ears peeking above the horizon form a distance, according to Colorado State University. 
The area is considered sacred to native tribes in the region, who lobbied for the area's protection. 
Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is largely known for its rugged landscape featuring colorful cliffsides, and it's scientific value for geologists, paleontologists and other researchers. 
It lies in southern Utah, west of Bears Ears. 
The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance made maps showing the cuts to both national monuments, which greatly reduce their sizes and split each into multiple, disconnected sections. 
Previous cuts and restorations 
This is not the first time Trump has tried to reduce the size of these national monuments, although it is the most significant cut he has attempted to make. 
In December 2017, his administration reduced Grand Staircase to about 840,000 acres and Bears Ears to roughly 200,000 acres. 
In October 2021, former President Joe Biden restored both monuments to their original sizes, plus an additional 11,200 acres that Trump first added to Bears Ears in his first administration. 
Even so, legal challenges to Trump's original cuts continued. 
In November 2024, a judge declined to dismiss lawsuits attempting to stop the cuts to the national monuments. 
The Center for Biological Diversity says those lawsuits are still pending, as of this writing. 
Conservation groups such as the Center for Biological Diversity and Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance are also challenging the Trump administration's 2026 cuts in the courts, making the permanency of the potential reductions unknown at the time of publication. 
In Trump's July 2026 proclamations, it is noted that Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante both contain valuable mineral resources within their borders. 
Due to their national monument status, those areas are protected from things like mining. 
Therefore, reducing their sizes would allow the previously protected landscapes to to be mined. 
This is not the first time we've fact-checked claims about the Trump administration's attempts to restrict or reduce protections on federal lands that would steer the focus of those areas from conservation to resource production. 
In May 2026, the administration finalized a rule to revoke grazing permits from a herd of bison so cattle ranchers could instead use the land. 
In June, social media users condemned proposed Trump administration changes that would revoke protections from habitat that is critical to the rare, endangered whooping crane so those lands could be used for other purposes. 
Article reasoning-pattern comparisonThis article: 10.5%Emery Winter: 2.2%Snopes: 2.4%Confirmation Bias10.5%This article: 7.4%Emery Winter: 0.5%Snopes: 0.8%Anchoring Bias7.4%This article: 17.5%Emery Winter: 4.5%Snopes: 3.5%Availability Heuristic17.5%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.8%Snopes: 1.3%Representativeness Heuristic0.0%This article: 4.6%Emery Winter: 0.3%Snopes: 0.2%Hindsight Bias4.6%This article: 7.7%Emery Winter: 0.6%Snopes: 1.2%Overconfidence Bias7.7%This article: 7.1%Emery Winter: 5.1%Snopes: 2.4%Framing Effect7.1%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.2%Snopes: 0.2%Loss Aversion0.0%This article: 8.8%Emery Winter: 0.8%Snopes: 0.5%Status Quo Bias8.8%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.1%Sunk Cost Effect0.0%This article: 1.4%Emery Winter: 1.2%Snopes: 0.5%Optimism Bias1.4%This article: 7.4%Emery Winter: 0.8%Snopes: 0.4%Pessimism Bias7.4%This article: 31.9%Emery Winter: 6.8%Snopes: 5.0%Negativity Bias31.9%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.6%Self-Serving Bias0.0%This article: 3.9%Emery Winter: 0.5%Snopes: 0.7%Fundamental Attribution Error3.9%This article: 4.7%Emery Winter: 0.3%Snopes: 0.1%Actor-Observer Bias4.7%This article: 2.7%Emery Winter: 0.2%Snopes: 0.5%In-Group Bias2.7%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.4%Out-Group Homogeneity Bias0.0%This article: 3.8%Emery Winter: 1.1%Snopes: 0.6%Halo Effect3.8%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.0%Horn Effect0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.0%Dunning-Kruger Effect0.0%This article: 11.0%Emery Winter: 2.2%Snopes: 1.5%Recency Bias11.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.5%Primacy Effect0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.1%Blind-Spot Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 1.5%Ad Hominem0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.4%Straw Man0.0%This article: 22.5%Emery Winter: 5.8%Snopes: 6.0%Appeal to Authority22.5%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.3%Snopes: 0.9%False Dilemma0.0%This article: 2.2%Emery Winter: 0.5%Snopes: 0.4%Slippery Slope2.2%This article: 5.5%Emery Winter: 0.3%Snopes: 0.1%Circular Reasoning5.5%This article: 4.6%Emery Winter: 2.4%Snopes: 3.6%Hasty Generalization4.6%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.6%Snopes: 0.7%Red Herring0.0%This article: 13.1%Emery Winter: 3.2%Snopes: 1.4%Bandwagon13.1%This article: 5.3%Emery Winter: 1.9%Snopes: 3.0%Appeal to Emotion5.3%This article: 2.2%Emery Winter: 0.1%Snopes: 0.4%Begging the Question2.2%This article: 6.1%Emery Winter: 2.0%Snopes: 1.6%Post Hoc (False Cause)6.1%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.2%Tu Quoque0.0%This article: 0.9%Emery Winter: 0.6%Snopes: 1.6%Burden of Proof0.9%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.2%Snopes: 0.3%Appeal to Nature0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.3%Snopes: 0.2%Composition/Division0.0%This article: 4.4%Emery Winter: 1.9%Snopes: 1.9%Anecdotal4.4%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.1%No True Scotsman0.0%This article: 2.2%Emery Winter: 1.8%Snopes: 1.8%Ambiguity (Equivocation)2.2%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.0%Gambler’s Fallacy0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.1%Middle Ground0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.1%Personal Incredulity0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.1%Special Pleading0.0%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.0%Snopes: 0.3%Genetic Fallacy0.0%This article: 22.6%Emery Winter: 5.0%Snopes: 3.4%Unattributed Quote22.6%This article: 6.4%Emery Winter: 3.9%Snopes: 2.3%Quote-first Misdirection6.4%This article: 22.2%Emery Winter: 1.7%Snopes: 2.5%Biased Writer Voice22.2%This article: 0.9%Emery Winter: 0.1%Snopes: 0.7%Indoctrination0.9%This article: 6.0%Emery Winter: 0.4%Snopes: 0.2%Politically Left Leaning Bias6.0%This article: 8.3%Emery Winter: 0.8%Snopes: 0.4%Politically Right Leaning Bias8.3%This article: 0.0%Emery Winter: 0.6%Snopes: 0.4%Attempt to Sell a Product or S…0.0%

636 words analyzed.

Speakers

3speakers12%attributed speech561writer words
Voice mapSelect a segment to jump to its words
Writer's voice • 9 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 8 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 13 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 12 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 28 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 41 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 43 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 6 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 4 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 28 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 28 words • 100.0% coverageColorado State University • 34 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 17 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 24 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 9 words • 0.0% coverageSouthern Utah Wilderness Alliance • 26 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 4 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 29 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 19 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 30 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 9 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 18 words • 0.0% coverageCenter for Biological Diversity • 15 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 38 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 22 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 14 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 14 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 35 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 25 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 34 words • 100.0% coverage
100%flagged-word coverage
26 attributed words35% of attributed speech98% writer coverage
0%50.0%100.0%Biased Writer Voice+79.5 ptsWriter: 20.5%Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance: 100.0%100.0%Unattributed Quote-23.0 ptsWriter: 23.0%Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance: 0.0%0.0%Politically Right Leaning -9.4 ptsWriter: 9.4%Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance: 0.0%0.0%Quote-first Misdirection-7.3 ptsWriter: 7.3%Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance: 0.0%0.0%Politically Left Leaning B-6.8 ptsWriter: 6.8%Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance: 0.0%0.0%Indoctrination-1.1 ptsWriter: 1.1%Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance: 0.0%0.0%

Attribution is sentence-level. Pattern percentages are calculated only from words assigned to that voice.

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Analysis

Hover over highlighted words in the article to view the associated bias or fallacy analysis.