Biden to name two new national monuments in California

Jan. 7 (UPI) -- President Joe Biden is expected to sign a proclamation naming two new national monuments in California, protecting 848,000 acres of land the White House says are of scientific, cultural, ecological, and historical importance.

The Chuckwalla National Monument and the Sattitla Highlands National Monument, surrounded by the canyon walls of the eastern Coachella Valley, will become part of the more than 600 million acres Biden has protected during his presidency.

"With today's designations and yesterday's actions to protect the East and West coasts and Northern Bering Sea from offshore oil and natural gas drilling, President Biden has now protected 647 acres of U.S. land and water," the White House said in a statement.

The action also helps complete the largest corridor of protected lands in the continental United States, referred to as the Moab to Mojave Conservation Corridor. The land includes an important cultural and spiritual landscape that has been populated and traveled by Tribal nations and indigenous people since before the United States came into existence.

The area also includes a wide range of natural and cultural resources along with the Colorado River, across the Colorado Plateau into the California deserts.

"By designating this new national monument, President Biden is enhancing outdoor access for nearby communities, preserving critical habitat for imperiled and rare species, and ensuring the ancestral homelands and sacred cultural legacies and the region's Tribal Nations endure for generations to come," the White House said.

"All the while demonstrating that clean energy and conservation can go hand in hand. The monument will be managed by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management."