The Latest on Izembek Refuge Land Exchange and Road

On August 18, 2026, A federal judge voided the land exchange between the federal government and an Alaska Native village corporation, dealing a blow to the State of Alaska’s efforts to build a road through the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge on the Alaska Peninsula. Alaska U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason determined in the 89-page ruling that the Trump administration violated multiple laws when it approved the land deal in October.

Gleason’s decision is a loss for the King Cove Corp. and also the state, which had planned to begin road construction through the refuge after the Trump administration in July issued a permit for a 19-mile, single-lane, unpaved road from King Cove to a jet-accessible airport at Cold Bay. King Cove, a community of 800 or so residents, has long sought the road to reach the Cold Bay airport to access life-saving medical treatment at hospitals in big cities such as Anchorage.

A state official said Wednesday that the state plans to appeal the decision and will look for opportunities to build some of the road, as the appeal progresses.

The judge’s decision is a victory for conservation groups and Alaska Native villages that had brought multiple lawsuits against the Trump administration and King Cove Corp. to undo the land deal. The state had also intervened in the case on the side of the federal government and the village corporation.

Defenders of Wildlife, one of the groups filing a lawsuit, on Monday took legal action to stop the state and the village corporation from building a 2.8-mile road segment on lands owned by the village corporation in the refuge. The State of Alaska in July had said that with the federal government’s road permit in hand, it would soon begin building the road.

The 310,000-acre refuge provides important habit for migrating birds and other wildlife, including the Steller’s eider and a population of otters that are both protected under the Endangered Species Act.

The plaintiffs, including three Alaska Native tribes whose members hunt the refuge’s migrating birds but live hundreds of miles to the north, have argued that the road will harm conservation and subsistence values and set a negative precedent for more than 100 million acres of federally protected lands across Alaska.

Under the exchange, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service conveyed roughly 490 acres of federal land to to King Cove Corp. The village corporation conveyed 1,739 acres near Kinzarof Lagoon to the U.S. and relinquished its selection rights to about 5,430 acres within the refuge, Gleason said in her decision. Gleason said that the exchange was completed in violation of the Endangered Species Act, the Refuge Act and the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, and the exchange“ has no ‘force and effect.’” The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service did not fully complete a biological opinion of the impact of the road when it determined the land exchange would not jeopardize the federally protected eiders and otters, Gleason said.

The agency also issued a document in March, months after the exchange had been approved, correcting errors in the biological opinion. The changes showed a much bigger impact from the exchange to eiders than previously calculated, Gleason noted. “The court finds that the mathematical errors in the (biological opinion) are so significant that they rendered the Service’s no-jeopardy determination for Steller’s eiders in the (biological opinion) arbitrary and capricious in violation of the Administrative Procedures Act,” Gleason wrote.

“The Court found several legal errors with the Secretary’s merits determination, warranting vacatur,” or nullification, of the exchange, Gleason wrote.

“The Court acknowledges the hardships identified by federal defendants and the serious concerns of the residents of King Cove that have sought for decades to have a road to Cold Bay constructed,” Gleason wrote. “But those circumstances cannot justify keeping in place an unlawful land exchange that would allow road construction to proceed.”

From an article in the Anchorage Daily News by Alex DeMarban published August 18, 2026. The full article is at https://www.adn.com/politics/2026/08/18/federal-judge-throws-out-king-cove-land-exchange-a-blow-to-alaskas-plans-to-build-road-through-izembek-refuge/