Congress repeals secret 2014 deal handing Arizona's sacred land to foreign miners
H.R. 6391 — Save Oak Flat from Foreign Mining Act · Filed by Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ) · 33 cosponsors · Introduced Dec 3, 2025 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill repeals a 2014 law (Section 3003 of the Defense Authorization Act) that required the Forest Service to hand over Oak Flat, a 2,422-acre parcel in Arizona's Tonto National Forest, to Resolution Copper—a joint venture owned 55% by Rio Tinto and 45% by BHP, both foreign mining companies with majority revenue from China. The bill then withdraws Oak Flat from all mining, leasing, and mineral extraction, permanently blocking the mine. Citizens benefit by preserving a sacred Indigenous site, protecting Arizona's water supply from depletion and contamination, and preventing U.S. public resources from being extracted and exported to China.
Why we flagged it
The bill's operative mechanism is a repeal of a 2014 land-transfer mandate followed by a permanent withdrawal of the land from mining and mineral extraction. This is a straightforward public-land preservation measure, not a deregulation or subsidy.
What the text implies
- Repealing Section 3003 also eliminates any environmental review or mitigation requirements that may have been tied to the original land exchange, though the bill's withdrawal provision provides independent protection.
- The bill's findings extensively document foreign ownership and China-export patterns, signaling a national-security framing that may influence future mineral-extraction policy beyond this single site.
- Permanent withdrawal of Oak Flat may set precedent for protecting other culturally significant or water-critical public lands from extraction, potentially affecting future mining permits across the West.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
The bill protects a sacred Indigenous cultural site from destruction, preserves critical water resources in a drought-stricken region from depletion and contamination, and prevents U.S. public resources from being extracted and exported to benefit foreign corporations and China. The only cost is to the mining companies' profit expectations, not to citizens.
Named in the bill
Resolution Copper Mining LLC, Rio Tinto, BHP, Chinalco, People's Republic of China, U.S. Forest Service, Tonto National Forest, Arizona State Land Department, Chí'chil Biłdagoteel Historic District, East Salt River Valley, Gila River watershed
Where it stands
33 cosponsors: 33 Democrats.
- Dec 3, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Dec 3, 2025 — Referred to House Committee on Natural Resources · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on Natural Resources”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
1 lobbying clients named this bill on 2 disclosure filings across 2 quarters, Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $60,000 in lobbying spend. A filing names 6 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 0% of bills with at least one filing.
Adelita Grijalva, the sponsor, reported $451,283 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- Resolution Copper Mining LLC — $60,000 on 2 filings
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 20, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (6,775 characters) on Jun 3, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 20, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
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