Minnesota's outgoing governor signed an executive order blocking copper-nickel mining permits near the Boundary Waters, and the state's top House Republican says the move sacrifices American jobs and national security to spite the Trump administration.
House Majority Whip Tom Emmer tore into Gov. Tim Walz on Breitbart News Saturday, calling the executive order an act of political spite by a lame-duck governor who has already dropped his 2026 reelection bid. Walz signed Executive Order 26-10 on Tuesday, directing state agencies to halt permitting and leasing for nonferrous mining in the Rainy River Headwaters Watershed, the corridor that runs alongside one of the largest untapped copper and nickel deposits in North America.
The order also directs a review of 38 existing mineral leases in the area, including one held by Twin Metals Minnesota, a subsidiary of Chilean mining conglomerate Antofagasta. Twin Metals has sought to mine copper, nickel, and other precious metals in the Superior National Forest since 2019, according to the AP.
Walz framed the move as a conservation victory. "As far as my administration is concerned, the fight for the future of the Boundary Waters is over," he said. In a separate statement, the governor called the Boundary Waters a "sacred place" and said it was Minnesota's "duty" to keep it "wild, pristine and unharmed."
Emmer sees it differently, and he did not mince words.
Emmer told host Matthew Boyle that the executive order does far more damage than Walz lets on. The congressman argued that blocking domestic mining of critical minerals does not protect the environment globally, it simply moves extraction to countries with far weaker standards.
"He is going to empower our adversaries like the Communist Party of China. We have the most stringent environmental laws on the face of the planet. If you're going to end mining in the United States of America, you're going to send it to places like China and Russia where they don't care."
Emmer described the mineral deposit in northeastern Minnesota's Duluth Complex as "among the largest precious-metals finds in the world," containing copper, nickel, and palladium, metals critical to defense manufacturing, electronics, and energy infrastructure. Fox News reported that the Duluth Complex is the largest known untapped source of nickel and copper in North America.
That makes Walz's order a national security question, not just a state environmental dispute. Emmer argued that handing China a strategic advantage in critical mineral production is the real consequence of the ban, regardless of whatever conservation language the governor's office wraps around it.
The timing sharpens the conflict. In April, Congress voted to repeal a 20-year federal moratorium on new mining leases near the Boundary Waters, a ban originally imposed during the Biden administration. Rep. Pete Stauber, the Republican who represents Minnesota's Iron Range district, sponsored the resolution. It cleared the Senate 50-49, and President Trump signed it into law.
Walz's executive order is a direct counter to that federal action. By directing state agencies to refuse participation in federal environmental reviews and halt all permitting work, the governor effectively froze any progress toward mining in the watershed, even after the federal green light.
Stauber called the order "an outright war on Northern Minnesota and our way of life."
Emmer went further, framing Walz's move as an act driven not by policy conviction but by resentment. The congressman noted that Walz is leaving office after dropping his reelection bid and accused him of using his remaining months to undermine federal policy out of spite.
"But this lame duck loser... named Tim Walz, he's not only, I think, complicit in the fraud in this state, he's completely incompetent and now he's being spiteful. Literally as he's leaving office in the next couple of months, what he's doing is he's trying to exercise executive authority from the governor's office to end mining in Minnesota."
Emmer estimated that the order puts "hundreds if not thousands" of union jobs at risk on Minnesota's northern Iron Range, a region built on mining and already struggling with economic decline. He also argued that the ban costs Minnesota's public school trust lands revenue, since mineral leases on state land generate funding for schools.
That jobs argument carries particular weight because it cuts against the Democratic Party's claim to represent working-class voters. Emmer faulted Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan by name, accusing them of invoking the working class while governing only for "one downtown Minneapolis."
Emmer rejected the premise that the mining debate is really about environmental protection at all.
"We're all environmentalists... We all appreciate clean water, clean air. We want to leave the planet in as good or better condition than we found it. But that's not the issue, even though that's what he wants to claim the issue is."
Environmental groups disagree. Ingrid Lyons, executive director of Save the Boundary Waters, praised Walz's order, saying the federal government had "sold out our canoe country earlier this year by stripping away protections that took hundreds of thousands of Minnesotans' voices and years of work to secure." Becky Rom, the group's chairperson, argued that "copper mining and the Boundary Waters cannot safely coexist."
For all the fury it has generated, Walz's order may have a short shelf life. The AP reported that Executive Order 26-10 expires 90 days after Walz leaves office, meaning it will lapse by next April unless the next governor adopts it. And there is currently no shovel-ready mining project in the area, which limits the order's immediate practical impact.
But the symbolic and political damage is real. The order signals to mining companies, investors, and union workers that Minnesota's state government will use every available lever to block development, even after the federal government clears the path. Twin Metals has pursued its project for years. A state-level freeze, however temporary, adds uncertainty and cost.
It also sets up a fight for the next governor's race. Whoever succeeds Walz will face an immediate decision: extend the order or let it die. That choice will define whether Minnesota's Iron Range gets a chance to develop one of the continent's richest mineral deposits or watches the opportunity move overseas.
Walz dropped his 2026 reelection bid amid a social services fraud scandal that has dogged his administration. He will not be the one to face that choice. But the Iron Range workers and taxpayers who depend on mining revenue will live with whatever his successor decides.
A governor on his way out the door used his last months to block jobs, undercut federal law, and hand a strategic advantage to America's chief global rival. The people of northern Minnesota did not vote for that, and they deserve a leader who governs for their future, not against it.
