A Plan To Mine The Minnesota Wilderness
July 2, 2019 5:37 pm
By Hiroko Tabuchi and Steve Eder
June 25, 2019 NY Times
A Plan To Mine The Minnesota Wilderness Hit A Dead End. Then Trump Became President.
The project’s reversal of fortunes has angered environmentalists and focused attention on an unusual connection between a Chilean billionaire and President Trump’s family.
ELY, Minn. — In the waning months of the Obama administration, a Chilean conglomerate was losing a fight with the United States government over a copper mine that it wanted to build near a pristine wilderness area in Minnesota.
The election of President Trump, with his business-friendly bent, turned out to be a game-changer for the project.
Beginning in the early weeks of Mr. Trump’s presidency, the administration worked at a high level to remove roadblocks to the proposed mine, government emails and calendars show, overruling concerns that it could harm the Boundary Waters, a vast landscape of federally protected lakes and forests along the border with Canada.
