Tolkkinen: Why worry about traffickers destroying Boundary Waters when Stauber is willing to do it himself?

Rep. Pete Stauber may have been spending too much time in D.C. in recent years and not enough time soaking in the natural beauty of his district.

What other explanation could there be for his enthusiasm for a plan to install surveillance equipment and infrastructure and allow motorboats and airplanes in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness and Voyageurs National Park?

The Border Lands Conservation Act, introduced in the U.S. Senate by none other than Sen. Mike “Let’s Make Political Hay Off The Assassination of Rep. Melissa Hortman” Lee of Utah, would allow new roads, spy towers (called “observation points” in the bill, but I doubt they’d build observation points on the forest floor), surveillance equipment, bridges, fences, and motorized vehicles and boats into this refuge for wild things and world-weary humans. It permits aircraft to take off and land in wilderness areas, which, unless they’re using floatplanes, would seem to require landing pads and runways.

Lee and Stauber seem to feel that these watery wilderness areas are the next front in the war against human traffickers, terrorists and drug smugglers, so we’re going to sacrifice them in the name of protecting our country.

Isn’t that lovely? Isn’t it exactly what you want in your back country adventure, to know you are being surveilled by the Department of Homeland Security while you skinny-dip in the clear waters of a lake you thought you had all to yourself?

Wouldn’t you love to hear federal agents zooming around the wilderness on ATVs?

Wouldn’t it be so wonderful if your brown or Black family or friends were accosted by agents demanding to see ID?

You may remember Sen. Lee from that shameful debacle earlier this year (not the one where he posted comments about Hortman’s death; that was a different debacle) when he tried to sell off millions of acres of federal land, only to be defeated by a coalition of hunters, anglers and outdoor recreation enthusiasts.

People love their public land. Left, right, middle, all creeds, all races, all Americans, it’s our public land. Even the poorest among us own this land, which extends well beyond the boundaries of national parks. There are huge swaths where we can camp and hike for free.

The people rose up in defense of these lands and Lee backed down.

But now he’s back, like a Grinch that never learns his lesson. He wants to “protect” the northern and southern borders by staking out all federal land within 100 miles. And Stauber, whose district includes the Boundary Waters and Voyageurs, is on board.

Stauber blamed the Biden administration for allowing illegal crossings that resulted in “left-behind trash, human waste, illegal trails and abandoned campfires.”

For sure nobody wants abandoned campfires or people using the woods as their personal potty. But it doesn’t look like that was caused by border crossers. A lot of that happened during the Trump administration in 2020, when American citizens turned to outdoor recreation during the lockdown. Not that I blame President Donald Trump for that, but let’s not blame Joe Biden, either. Or illegal border crossings.

Lee’s proposal looks like a cure in search of a disease. Actually, it appears worse than any disease it could prevent.

While there have been reports of increased crossings along the U.S.-Canada border, the area primarily affected isn’t in Minnesota. It’s the Swanton sector, which includes Vermont and parts of New York and New Hampshire. Even where human smuggling is known to exist in Minnesota, it has taken place far to the west of the wilderness area, through property that is not federally owned or managed.

Lee’s bill contains no exemptions for wilderness. In fact, it weakens the language of the 1964 Wilderness Act. Lee either doesn’t know any better or doesn’t care. He’s from Utah, not Minnesota. This is where we depend on our own people in Congress to set him straight, to demand the bill be amended or scrapped altogether. We expect a strong defense, not Stauber’s acquiescence. Stauber looks more like he wants to rise in the GOP ranks, not defend his own district.

If illegal immigration through wilderness areas and national parks is truly a concern, the bill could just as easily require the government to station its spies outside their boundaries to catch unapproved visitors when they emerge, bug-bitten, soaked from spills, and blistered from days of hiking or paddling.

Of equal concern is language in the bill that calls for reducing “hazardous fuels” on federal property and installing “fuel breaks.” The bill contains no definition of these “hazardous fuels,” but you and I both know what they mean: Trees. This bill would permit logging on federally managed land, with the exception of tribal land; it does not expressly exempt wilderness areas.

This is not the first time Stauber has spoken out in favor of actions to the detriment of our wild places. He has long supported a foreign mining company that wants to develop a copper-nickel mine 9 miles southeast of Ely that may well contaminate the clearest, cleanest waters in the state.

Stauber has done some good things for his district, like supporting increased funding for special education and protecting pensions. But our wild places need protection, too.