Biden creates 2 new national monuments, setting a conservation record

President Biden is creating two new national monuments in California on Tuesday, preserving the lands from development and setting a record for the most land and waters conserved by any president, the White House said.

The Sáttítla Highlands National Monument covers more than 224,000 acres in Northern California, and includes the ancestral homelands of the Pit River Tribe and Modoc Peoples. A dormant volcano is at its center, and it is home to the longest-known lava tube system in the world.

The Chuckwalla National Monument covers more than 624,000 acres south of Joshua Tree National Park in southern California, and includes sacred sites important to five groups of indigenous peoples and 50 rare species of plants and animals, including the Chuckwalla lizard.

The Chuckwalla monument is part of a corridor of protected lands stretching about 600 miles west through a total of close to 18 million acres in California, Nevada, Arizona and Utah that the White House is calling the Moab to Mojave Conservation Corridor.

In total, the White House said Biden protected 674 million acres of land and waters through monuments and other designations during his four years in office.