"Karen Budd-Falen, a self-described “cowboy lawyer," owns ranch operations and real estate rentals. Her family has also had sizable investments in oil companies."
"After a long delay, the Interior Department’s Office of Government Ethics last week provided Public Domain the financial disclosure of Karen Budd-Falen, a high-ranking Trump appointee at DOI.
Budd-Falen is a lightning rod figure in western public lands circles. A hero to ranching groups and private property activists, she is scorned by many conservationists for her long history of fighting to roll back environmental protections. In 2024, she represented ranching organizations and other groups in a legal filing that supported Utah’s failed bid to seize control of millions of acres of federal public land — land that she now plays a key role in managing.
Budd-Falen, a veteran of the first Trump administration, has largely flown under the radar since she was appointed in March as associate deputy secretary to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum — a position that does not require Senate confirmation. She temporarily served as Interior’s acting deputy secretary, the agency’s second-highest position, until Kate Macgregor, another veteran of Trump 1.0, was confirmed to the post in May. The administration has released little information about Budd-Falen’s activities at DOI, and public records requests for her calendar and other key documents have gone unfulfilled to date.
But Budd-Falen likely wields enormous power within the Department. Indeed, in a private email to a Republican state official in Wyoming shortly after President Trump’s election victory last year, she wrote, “I certainly don’t want to go back to DC again unless I am the God of Interior which won’t happen!”"
Jimmy Tobias and Chris D'Angelo report for Public Domain December 4, 2025.
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