A group of veterans called for the protection of California desert public lands Tuesday in Joshua Tree.
According to the nonprofit Vet Voice Foundation, public lands are facing unprecedented threats from the federal government amid multiple attempts to privatize and sell-off these places. The California desert, which includes millions of acres of public lands, is a part of the nation’s military history, supports small businesses and helps create jobs while providing places where veterans and others spend time outdoors, Foundation members said.
Over the past year, there have been multiple attempts to pass legislation that would sell-off public lands acres nationwide, including in California, and the mass firings of agency employees who were responsible for managing these places.
In November, President Donald Trump nominated Steve Pearce, a longtime advocate for the privatization and sale of public lands, to lead the Bureau of Land Management. If the U.S. Senate confirms his nomination, Pearce will be responsible for millions of acres of California desert public lands.
“Veterans work as wildland firefighters, park rangers, land managers, and biologists,” Janessa Goldbeck, CEO of Vet Voice Foundation and a U.S. Marine Corps veteran, said in a statement. “Thousands more veterans build small businesses around public lands — as guides, outfitters, outdoor instructors, tourism operators, and more. Threats to these places are a threat to how many veterans make a living. This issue is not theoretical. It is about paychecks, pensions, mortgages, and family stability.”
Chemehuevi Indian Tribe Chairman Emeritus Glenn Lodge also spoke at the event Tuesday about the significance of public lands.
“California desert public lands are our homelands,” Lodge, a U.S. Army Special Forces veteran, said in a statement. “We have stewarded these places from time immemorial and we have served our nation abroad as well. We stand against any threats to our desert lands as they are threats to our very way of life. These places take care of us and we must take care of them.”
Citing data from the state, Vet Voice Foundation noted that Native Americans are 10% of veterans who live in California and have highest per-capita involvement — five times the national average — of any ethnic or racial group in the U.S. military.
The California desert is also a place where many veterans seek solace and time in the outdoors after returning from service, according to the Foundation. Veterans often find significant mental and physical health benefits from spending time in natural settings such as national parks and monuments.
Vet Voice officials pointed to the especially significant connection veterans have with the California desert because of its military heritage. During World War II, locations in the California desert were part of the broader Desert Training Center, where Gen. George Patton prepared American troops for harsh desert warfare abroad. Hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops came to the Desert Training Center, and traces of this history can still be found and honored.
Over the past year, Vet Voice officials said they have heard from many veterans who are concerned about the affect rollbacks of public lands’ acreage on popular hunting, fishing and camping areas, as well as the small businesses and local economies that depend on visitors to such locales. The Foundation’s event Tuesday in the desert was a call to action for elected officials and leaders to listen to veterans about why public lands should be protected, organizers said.
“Support for public lands is broadly bipartisan,” Goldbeck added. “With public lands under unprecedented attack right now, veterans are leading the charge to ensure public land that belongs to all Americans remains in public hands.”
In February a statement to HeySoCal.com from the U.S. Interior Department, which oversees BLM, said, “There are no plans to privatize any public lands managed by Interior. Additionally, we cannot speculate on future actions that might involve national monuments.”
Pearce, a Republican who represented New Mexico’s 2nd Congressional District, said if confirmed as BLM director he will meet with a Southern California Intertribal Commission to learn more about the recently designated Chuckwalla National Monument and engage in “meaningful” consultation with tribal leaders.
“As a representative of southern New Mexico, we had multiple Pueblos, we had Apache tribes and we had Navajos,” Pearce said during a Senate committee hearing in February. “We worked extremely closely with all of those to accomplish objectives they were looking for in their lands. I would visualize very similar. The Native Americans sometimes are overlooked, from Washington.
“We became a voice for them and would continue to do that,” Pearce said.
Over the last year indications surfaced from the Trump administration that canceling protections for the nation’s public lands, including an acreage reduction for Chuckwalla, had piqued the administration’s interest.
President Joe Biden established the 624,270-acre Chuckwalla National Monument in Riverside and Imperial counties shortly before he left office in January 2025.
Founded in 2009, Vet Voice Foundation is a national nonprofit “that mobilizes veterans and military families to strengthen democracy and serve their communities,” according to the organization, which “works to ensure that national parks, monuments, forests, and other shared landscapes remain protected for future generations while highlighting the deep connection many veterans have to the outdoors after their military service.”
More information is available at the organization’s website vvfnd.org.
