Two Senators, One Blind Spot, One Lease That Won't Hold
Senator Dan Sullivan needs to catch up.
On June 15, 2026, Murkowski joined a bipartisan letter demanding the National Science Foundation halt its plans to dismantle the Ocean Observatories Initiative — a $386 million network of 900 ocean monitoring instruments being pulled from Alaska waters under the Trump administration's budget priorities.
Sullivan was not on the letter.
That absence matters — not because Sullivan needs to pick a fight with the administration he largely supports, but because of what is sitting directly in Norton Sound waiting to be developed, and what the instrument removal does to Alaska's ability to develop it.
The BOEM lease Sullivan supports is being undermined by the same administration.
On January 29, 2026, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management — a federal agency under the same Department of Interior both senators have championed for Alaska development — published a Request for Information for the first-ever Alaska OCS minerals lease sale. One of only two specifically named nearshore deposit areas is Norton Sound Heavy Mineral Sands.
This is exactly the kind of domestic critical mineral development both senators say they want. American resources. American jobs. American supply chain security. Shallow water. Accessible location. Adjacent to Nome.
Now here is the problem both senators need to understand.
The Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act requires BOEM to conduct adequate environmental analysis before issuing any OCS mineral lease. That analysis requires baseline oceanographic data — bottom temperature profiles, sediment transport patterns, water chemistry, biological baseline — for the specific lease area.
The OOI instruments being dismantled were generating that data for Alaska waters. The Northern Bering Sea bottom trawl survey — the instrument that measures bottom temperatures in Norton Sound specifically — did not run in 2026. NOAA's budget has been cut $1.7 billion. The Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research has been eliminated as a line office.
The result is precise and legal: BOEM cannot conduct legally adequate environmental analysis for the Norton Sound Heavy Mineral Sands lease without data that no longer exists.
The Legal Exposure
Any lease issued without that analysis is vulnerable to challenge under the Administrative Procedure Act as arbitrary and capricious. Environmental organizations know this. Tribal governments know this. The fishing industry knows this. Every one of them has standing to challenge a Norton Sound OCS lease that proceeds without legally adequate environmental baseline data.
The administration's budget cuts have handed opponents of Norton Sound mineral development the legal tool to stop it.
That is why she signed the letter.
The OOI dismantling is not just a climate science issue. It is an Alaska development issue. It is a fisheries management issue. It is a mineral lease issue. It is a legal liability issue for every federal action in Alaska waters that depends on the baseline data the OOI was generating.
Murkowski's letter to NSF framed it as a public safety and scientific integrity issue. That framing is correct as far as it goes.
But there is a harder economic argument that neither senator has yet made explicitly:
You cannot legally lease Norton Sound for mineral development without the environmental baseline the OOI was providing. Removing the instruments removes the legal foundation for the lease.
Sullivan supports the Norton Sound OCS mineral lease. Sullivan supports Alaska resource development. Sullivan is running for re-election on August 18, 2026 with an Alaska-first platform.
Sullivan needs to explain how the Norton Sound lease he supports survives legal challenge without the oceanographic baseline the administration he supports has eliminated.
That is not a gotcha question. It is the central operational question for Alaska's mineral development future in Norton Sound.
The answer is not complicated. Restore the instruments. Or enable private parties with documented geological frameworks and commitments to baseline data collection to fill the gap through prospecting permit conditions that serve both the lease process and the legal requirements OCSLA mandates.
Alaska's congressional delegation speaks with one voice when it matters. This is one of those times. The Norton Sound lease — the first-ever Alaska OCS minerals lease sale — deserves that unified voice. Not a split record where one senator signs the letter and the other stays silent while the legal foundation of the lease erodes.
Murkowski is already there. Sullivan needs to get there.
The instruments were the protection for the lease. Removing them removed the shield.
Both senators know it. Only one has said so publicly.
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