Budget Showdown

• Main Author: Dunaway, Finis
• Format: Book Part
• Language: English
• Published: University of North Carolina Press 2021
• Subjects: Arctic; Gwitchin; Alaska
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.5149/northcarolina/9781469661100.003.0019

The 1994 midterm elections caught the conservation community off guard. That November, Republicans seized control of the House and Senate, and soon introduced a controversial budget bill that included an Arctic Refuge drilling provision. Although President Bill Clinton had pledged his support for refuge protection, his environmental record was mixed. This chapter offers a behind-the-scenes look at the budget debate and Clinton’s eventual veto, emphasizing the crucial impact of grassroots citizen action—including Last Great Wilderness tours—on the president’s decision. It explains how refuge defenders once again applied the trickle-up theory of politics and profiles the outreach efforts organized by the Alaska Coalition, the Alaska Wilderness League, the Northern Alaska Environmental Center, and the Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation.