President Donald Trump signed an executive order on hunting access on September 17, 2026, directing several federal departments to revisit rules for hunting, shooting, land access, hunter education, and wildlife management. The order establishes a general policy favoring access to federally managed lands, but most of its provisions assign future work to agencies rather than changing every land-use rule at once. The deadlines range from 60 days to one year.
Two monuments get a 90-day directive
The most specific access provision concerns Castle Mountains National Monument in California and Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve in Idaho. Within 90 days, the secretary of the interior must allow hunting there for species that are not subject to 16 U.S.C. 1533. That statute contains the process for determining endangered and threatened species. The order says appropriately managed hunting would not put the historic and scientific objects protected by those monuments at risk. The 90-day date falls on December 16, 2026.
A broader provision gives the secretaries of War, Interior, Agriculture, and Commerce 180 days to propose changes to policies or regulations that restrict access to lands under their jurisdictions. The agencies are told to generally allow hunting unless a closure is justified by local resource conditions. National parks are excluded, and national monuments are also excluded except for the two named in the order. Because this section calls for proposals consistent with existing law, it does not itself erase site-specific closures or replace any rulemaking procedures that may apply.
Invalid Date
More Articles
The same 180-day assignment covers more than hunting seasons. It calls for proposed changes supporting federal hunting, fishing, shooting, and other recreation; construction, repair, and maintenance of access infrastructure; and access to hard-to-reach federal lands and waters. The listed tools include voluntary easements, land exchanges, and agreements with state and local governments that respect private property. Agencies are also directed to consider qualified volunteers for wildlife and invasive-species management, assistive technology on access trails and at hunting locations, and the use of traditional lead ammunition and tackle. That deadline is March 16, 2027.
Earlier deadlines for rivers, birds, and schools
The Agriculture Department has 60 days, until November 16, 2026, to review high-demand Forest Service river-access lotteries and begin reforms. The order says those reforms should prioritize U.S. citizens, including people whose earlier applications were unsuccessful, and prohibit automatic computer entries. Separately, Interior has 90 days to propose improvements to the administrative process for seasonal migratory-game-bird hunting. The order retains a role for Flyway Councils and says annual surveys, applicable guidance, and history must receive special consideration.
Labor and Education also receive a 90-day assignment. They must issue guidance clarifying whether federal education funds may be used for archery and hunter-education programs in schools. Within 180 days, Interior must use existing funding and authority to identify more opportunities and incentives for states to cultivate hunting among youth and veterans. The Department of Veterans Affairs is separately directed, to the extent the law permits, to prioritize grants supporting outdoor hunting and fishing through its Adaptive Sports Grant Program.
Interior has one year, through September 17, 2027, to encourage state fish and wildlife agencies to promote and expand Sunday hunting on state and federal lands. The wording matters: this is an instruction to encourage state agencies, not a federal override of state Sunday-hunting laws. Hunters still need to follow the seasons, methods, licensing rules, closures, and other requirements that apply where they hunt while agencies carry out the order.
Wildlife management and donated game
The order directs War, Interior, and Agriculture to coordinate with state agencies on game-population management. Listed methods include voluntarily reducing barriers to wildlife movement, controlling invasive species and disease, targeted management of predators and competing species, prescribed fire, vegetation and water projects, grazing, agricultural practices, and voluntary agreements with landowners and producers. It does not set numerical population targets or identify particular projects, so implementation will depend on later agency and state decisions.
Agriculture must also issue guidance supporting state venison-donation programs, including through the Emergency Food Assistance Program. Interior is told to encourage states to use Pittman-Robertson funds to manage overabundant wildlife, especially whitetail deer, including work that supports processing and donation of game meat to schools and food banks. The order makes implementation subject to applicable law and available appropriations, preserves existing agency authority, and creates no privately enforceable legal right. The first concrete milestone is Agriculture's 60-day river-lottery review and reform effort, followed one month later by the monument, migratory-bird, and education-guidance deadlines.
About the Author
Nick Sawinyh - Nick Sawinyh is a father, husband, hobby farmer, and gun enthusiast from Kentucky. He founded GunsNation and writes most of what appears on this blog.
