Utah’s 69th is the largest state House district by geography, spanning six counties and more than a million acres of the Navajo Nation. It’s also home to some 43,000 residents and the White Mesa Mill.
Last week, this is where uranium ore unexpectedly began getting trucked to from Pinyon Plain Mine near the Grand Canyon along highways through the Navajo Nation — before Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs convinced mine and mill operator Energy Fuels to temporarily pause shipments until a hauling agreement is reached with the tribal government.
Now more than ever, uranium politics are shaping this Utah state House race.
Logan Monson is the Republican nominee after narrowly beating Lynn Jackson, a former Bureau of Land Management employee, in the primary by 131 votes. He’s also the mayor of Blanding, a city six miles north of White Mesa Mill.
“I support responsible, safe mining of uranium,” Monson said. “If we can find ways to do it safer and better, we absolutely should. But I do support the uranium mill here, and I think that their intentions are really good.”
His opponent isn’t convinced.
“There needs to be something done,” Davina Smith said. “I’m against the hauling. There needs to be safer protocols. But for one, I would not like to see those hauled across my community or the nearby Native communities.”
Smith is Diné and a tribal consultant for the National Parks Conservation Association. Navajo Nation President Buu Nygren also appointed her to sit on the Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition.
Founded in 2015, this consoritum of five tribes from three states, including Arizona’s Navajo Nation and Hopi Tribe, has spent the last decade drafting a historic resource management plan for this sacred site spanning 1.3 million acres of federally-protected lands held by the Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service.
The Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition has authored the first-of-its-kind cooperative plan on how to co-manage this sprawling national monument with the feds. The plan’s public comment period ended in June, but its proximity to White Mesa Mill has worried Smith.
“If I had to say, ‘Am I for or against, I’m against Bears Ears.’ I’m not against protection of the land,” Monson explained. “Does that need to be done in 2 million acres? I don’t think so, and the burden falls on the local people. We should have buy-in, instead of just this kind of overarching plan, ‘You do what we say.’”
This is the second time Smith, the Democratic nominee from Monument Valley, Utah, is vying for the district after losing to Republican House Rep. Phil Lyman by about 3,400 votes in 2022. Lyman, who isn’t seeking re-election to the state House, lost to Utah Republican Gov. Stephen Cox after primarying him this year.
The Ute Mountain Ute Tribe’s community of White Mesa is five miles south of the mill. Smith pledges to represent them and other communities of color, but Indigenous uranium mill workers would also be among her constituents, too.
“Many of our employees are Navajo, so this isn’t them against us. Matter of fact, it’s us to get the best outcomes,” Energy Fuels President and CEO Mark Chalmers told KJZZ News. “There’s such a high unemployment rate on the reservation, and here, we are gaining momentum, where we’re providing additional jobs to Indigenous people.”
But when KJZZ News asked his company to disclose how much they earned – Energy Fuels didn’t do so – with a spokesperson writing, that financial info wasn’t at their “fingertips.”
Instead, the company cited an internal analysis from a few years ago, claiming that the average mill salary is 25% higher than the countywide figure for San Juan County, which according to U.S. Census data between 2018 and 2022 is less than $26,000, while the median household income is $52,000.
“Why do we want to continue to jump at a dollar sign,” Smith asked. “I do understand it can bring money to our communities, but let’s take a step back to find a cleaner and safer way than just rushing for money.”
