House votes to overturn Obama mining ban in Minnesota

The House voted Thursday to overturn the Obama administration’s decision to temporarily ban mining in an area of northern Minnesota’s Superior National Forest.

The Minnesota's Economic Rights in the Superior National Forest, or MINER, Act, passed 216-204, with nearly all Republicans in support and nearly all Democrats opposed.

The Obama administration’s decision, made the day before former President Obama left office, blocked mining for two years in an area of the forest near the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, in an effort to protect those waters form potential mine waste output.

The bill would also require the Forest Service to renew two-decades-old mining leases for sulfide-ore in the forest that had gone unused before Obama declined to renew them in 2016.

“This is about more than 10,000 jobs which are now at risk because of the lame-duck actions by the Obama administration,” said Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minn.), the bill’s sponsor. His district includes parts of northern Minnesota, but not the area that could be mined.

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