Save Oak Flat From Foreign Mining Act

Subjects: Public Lands and Natural Resources

Summary:  <p><strong>Save Oak Flat From Foreign Mining Act</strong></p> <p>This bill withdraws Oak Flat (which consists of 2,422 acres of Forest System land in the Tonto National Forest in southeastern Arizona) from mining activity. The bill repeals authorization for Oak Flat to be exchanged for land held by Resolution Copper Mining, LLC.</p>

<html><body><pre>[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 1351 Introduced in House (IH)]

&lt;DOC&gt;






118th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 1351

To repeal section 3003 of the Carl Levin and Howard P. ``Buck'' McKeon 
National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2015, and for other 
                               purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             March 3, 2023

   Mr. Grijalva (for himself, Mr. Sablan, Mr. Huffman, Ms. Moore of 
Wisconsin, Mr. Gomez, and Ms. Leger Fernandez) introduced the following 
     bill; which was referred to the Committee on Natural Resources

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To repeal section 3003 of the Carl Levin and Howard P. ``Buck'' McKeon 
National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2015, and for other 
                               purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Save Oak Flat From Foreign Mining 
Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds as follows:
            (1) Resolution Copper is jointly owned by two foreign 
        mining companies, Rio Tinto and BHP.
            (2) The largest shareholder of Rio Tinto is a foreign 
        mining entity, Shining Prospect Private Limited Company, that 
        is based in Singapore and is owned by the company Chinalco.
            (3) Chinalco is a holding company of the State-owned Assets 
        Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council 
        (SASAC) of the People's Republic of China.
            (4) Rio Tinto has a long record of human rights violations 
        and environmental devastation, harming Indigenous and other 
        communities around the world, including in Australia, Papua New 
        Guinea, Madagascar, Indonesia, Mongolia, and Namibia.
            (5) In 2020, Rio Tinto used explosives to blow up a site 
        sacred to the Puutu Kunti Kurrama and Pinikura peoples in 
        Western Australia, including the Juukan Gorge Rock Dwellings 
        which have evidence of human habitation dating back 46,000 
        years, resulting in immeasurable cultural and spiritual loss 
        and pain for Indigenous communities.
            (6) Oak Flat is located in the Tonto National Forest, which 
        was established in 1905 from the ancestral homelands of 
        American Indians who were forcibly removed at gunpoint from Oak 
        Flat and other areas of the Forest by the United States Army 
        during the 1880s and held as prisoners of war until the early 
        1900s.
            (7) Oak Flat is listed on the National Register of Historic 
        Places as the Traditional Cultural Property of Chi'chil 
        Bi5dagoteel Historic District.
            (8) Despite significant opposition in the United States 
        Congress, section 3003 was included as a rider in the Carl 
        Levin and Howard P. `Buck' McKeon National Defense 
        Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2015 (16 U.S.C. 539p) that 
        mandates the transfer of 2,422 acres of the sacred Oak Flat 
        area to foreign-owned Resolution Copper within 60 days of 
        publication of an Environmental Impact Statement.
            (9) To maximize shareholder profits through the 
        monetization of American resources, foreign-owned Resolution 
        Copper plans to use the cheapest and most destructive form of 
        mining, block cave mining, to develop a large-scale copper mine 
        that will obliterate the sacred Oak Flat area and result in a 
        crater 1.8 miles long and at least 1,000 feet deep, depriving 
        American Indians from conducting religious ceremonies and other 
        traditional practices.
            (10) Section 3003 lacks any requirement for foreign-owned 
        Resolution Copper to sell the copper it extracts from beneath 
        Oak Flat in the United States.
            (11) According to the United States Geological Survey's 
        2023 annual report, over 25 percent of all copper mined in the 
        United States in 2022 was exported overseas.
            (12) According to a 2020 University of Arizona report, 
        copper has consistently been a top export from the State of 
        Arizona, with most of it being shipped to the People's Republic 
        of China from the Port of Guaymas in Sonora, Mexico.
            (13) Foreign-owned Resolution Copper intends to extract 
        copper ore beneath Oak Flat, which will be slurried through 22 
        miles of pipelines and loaded onto trains to be likely shipped 
        overseas according to the Arizona Department of Transportation.
            (14) Foreign-owned Resolution Copper's mine will deplete, 
        destroy, and poison substantial amounts of limited and precious 
        water resources in a region that is already suffering from 
        severe water shortages by--
                    (A) pumping at least 775,000 acre-feet of water, 
                which is approximately 250,000,000,000 gallons over the 
                40-year life of the mine and is enough water to support 
                140,000 homes annually for 40 years; and
                    (B) redirecting water from the East Salt River 
                Valley, which will comprise approximately seventy 
                percent of the project's groundwater that will be used 
                to slurry 1,370,000,000 tons of toxic mine waste 
                through approximately 19 miles of pipelines to a 
                massive toxic waste dump.
            (15) Foreign-owned Resolution Copper's massive depletion of 
        local groundwater will cause land subsidence in the East Salt 
        River Valley by as much as 4 feet, and groundwater level 
        decreases by 199 feet in some areas.
            (16) Despite the rapidly deteriorating drought conditions 
        in the Colorado River Basin, foreign-owned Resolution Copper 
        received an allocation of over 2,200 acre-feet per year of 
        Central Arizona Project water in 2021, while homes across the 
        southwest continue to face looming water restrictions due to 
        oversubscribed water supplies.
            (17) Foreign-owned Resolution Copper's mine will result in 
        a permanent toxic waste dump site of approximately 500 feet 
        high and 3 miles long, spanning approximately 4,000 acres, in 
        the Gila River watershed, which will store 1,370,000,000 tons 
        of mine waste and destroy the ecosystem and Tribal cultural 
        resources in the region.

SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.

    In the Act:
            (1) Oak flat.--The term ``Oak Flat'' means the 
        approximately 2,422 acres of Forest System land in the Tonto 
        National Forest in southeastern Arizona commonly known as ``Oak 
        Flat'' and generally depicted as ``Oak Flat Withdrawal Area'' 
        on the map titled ``Save Oak Flat From Foreign Mining Act'' and 
        dated March 2, 2023.
            (2) Resolution copper.--The term ``Resolution Copper'' 
        means Resolution Copper Mining, LLC, owned by the foreign 
        entities of Rio Tinto and BHP.

SEC. 4. REPEAL AND WITHDRAWAL.

    (a) Repeal.--Section 3003 of the Carl Levin and Howard P. ``Buck'' 
McKeon National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2015 (16 
U.S.C. 539p) is repealed.
    (b) Withdrawal.--Subject to valid rights in existence on the date 
of the enactment of this Act, Oak Flat is withdrawn from all forms of--
            (1) entry, appropriation, or disposal under the public land 
        laws;
            (2) location, entry, and patent under the mining laws; and
            (3) disposition under all laws pertaining to mineral and 
        geothermal leasing or mineral materials.
                                 &lt;all&gt;
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