Climbing’s Appeal Transcends the Partisan Divide

By Laura Snider 

On Tuesday, November 5, Americans will go to the polls to cast their ballots and elect the next president of the United States along with every representative in the U.S. House, a third of the senators, and a variety of state and local officials. And while the results are unknown right now, a few things are certain regardless of the outcome of any single race.

On Wednesday morning, Access Fund’s dedicated staff will wake up, go back to work, and continue to fight for the protection and conservation of climbing areas across the country, just as they always have. It’s not that the outcome of the election doesn’t matter—the stakes are high for a number of issues that voters care deeply about and the two presidential candidates have substantially different priorities and visions for our country’s future.

But outdoor recreation in general, and climbing in particular, enjoys support by lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. To be successful, the nonpartisan Access Fund has always had to build and nurture relationships with both parties, and it’s also had to remain vigilant, watchdogging the policies of Democratic and Republican administrations, both of which have presented threats to climbing over the years.

“No matter the outcome of any particular election cycle, we do not stop working for climbers or for climbing. We just employ different strategies,” says Access Fund Executive Director Heather Thorne. “We’ve demonstrated to the people who make the rules affecting climbing access that we will never stop showing up.”

A Stunning Display of Bipartisan Support for Climbing

There are thousands of beloved crags scattered across the country, and their popularity is in no way influenced by whether the rocks happen to be in predominantly red or blue states. 

For example, Washington state, which is stacked with climbing, from after-work sport crags to full alpine adventures in the North Cascades, has not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since 1984. Meanwhile, Arkansas, which is home to miles and miles of gorgeous southern sandstone and incredible bouldering, has not voted for a Democratic presidential candidate since 1996. 

Climbing is important to the residents and the local economies in both states, and liberal or conservative, their elected representatives know this. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons Access Fund was successful in working collaboratively with senators from Washington and Arkansas to lead a stunning bipartisan effort in support of climbing. 

Sean Byrne, Heather Thorne, Tommy Caldwell, and Erik Murdock visit the Department of the Interior in 2024. © Access Fund.

In early September, Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Washington state Democrat, and Sen. John Boozman, an Arkansas Republican, cowrote a letter addressing the heads of the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture, which oversee the national parks and the national forests, respectively. 

The letter called on Secretaries Deb Haaland and Tom Vilsack to reverse course on new guidance proposed by the agencies that would—in a novel reinterpretation of the 1964 Wilderness Act—classify fixed anchors in Wilderness areas as prohibited. 

Access Fund sees this proposed guidance as one of the most significant threats to Wilderness climbing in the history of the organization and has leaned into decades of relationship-building with policymakers and legislators in Washington, D.C., to push back. 

Ultimately the letter was signed by 12 other senators from states where there is a significant amount of climbing on federal lands. And remarkably, six of those senators are Republicans and six are Democrats, if you include West Virginia’s Sen. Joe Manchin, who recently switched his affiliation to become an Independent but continues to caucus with the Democratic U.S. Senate majority. 

The letter, which Access Fund staff worked on for many months behind the scenes, is a rare display of agreement among senators from opposing parties, and it illustrates both the value of recreation to people across the political spectrum and Access Fund’s sway on Capitol Hill.

“This is an incredibly hard thing to execute, but we got it done and it really illustrates how bipartisan recreation is,” says Deputy Director Erik Murdock, who has been leading Access Fund’s government relations efforts for more than a decade. “We are one of the few advocacy groups that can facilitate both parties working together on a common goal. How often do Republicans and Democrats agree on anything? Not often, but they agree on climbing. This letter is incredible because it says, ‘We agree that climbing provides measurable benefits to the American public.’”

Working Across the Aisle to Get Legislation Passed

Advocating in Washington, D.C. © Kennedy Carey.

The ability to marshal support from both parties in such a forceful display did not develop overnight. It’s the result of years of hard work.

“Our success is based on our relationships and our track record,” says Jason Keith, Access Fund’s longtime senior policy advisor. “We haven’t just been around for a couple of years. We’ve been working on this for decades.”

This work has paid off with a number of significant bipartisan legislative wins. For example, Access Fund was able to insert language that protected Wilderness climbing in Utah’s Emery County—including the San Rafael Swell—into the Dingell Act, which passed into law in 2019. The bipartisan bill created an important legal precedent for wider protection of Wilderness climbing across the country.

The following year, in 2020, Access Fund rallied support to help shape and then pass the Great American Outdoors Act, a sweeping conservation bill that permanently funds the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which is critical for Access Fund’s land trust and calls for billions of dollars of investments in public lands. 

And Access Fund’s bipartisan work is not limited to the federal level. The organization also works across party lines at the state and local levels. In Texas, for example, Access Fund worked hard to ensure that rock climbing was expressly included in the statute  that provides liability protection for landowners who allow recreation on their properties. The bipartisan bill was passed unanimously by Texas legislators in 2019. 

As this congressional session comes to a close, Access Fund is engaged in one of its most important efforts to help pass bipartisan legislation yet. In response to the growing threats to Wilderness climbing from the National Park Service and U.S. Forest Service, Access Fund worked with Reps. John Curtis (R-UT) and Joe Neguse (D-CO) to introduce the Protecting America’s Rock Climbing (PARC) Act in the spring of 2023. That bill is now part of a larger package of proposed legislation called the Expanding Public Lands Outdoor Recreation Experiences (EXPLORE) Act, giving it a reasonable chance of being passed. When the time comes, Access Fund will rally the community to help get the bill across the finish line.

Rooted in Truth and Integrity

Building these relationships has depended, in part, on knowing how to talk about the importance of climbing access and conservation to people who hold a wide variety of values. Fortunately, in the case of climbing and recreation, there are plenty of upsides that hit the mark across the political spectrum. 

For example, the economic benefits that climbing can bring to rural communities and the tenet that government agencies should not unnecessarily burden access to public lands tends to resonate with conservative audiences, while landscape-level protection of large swaths of undeveloped land and its value for ecosystems in the face of a changing climate tends to resonate with more liberal audiences. 

Access Fund has also been extremely successful in leveraging the passionate advocates who belong to local climbing organizations (LCOs) when they visit the Hill. When talking to Sen. Manchin about climbing, for example, it’s helpful to have a West Virginia climber at the meeting—someone who can speak to what’s important to his constituents. With a network of LCOs that spans the country, Access Fund has a dedicated pool of people to work with on federal policies that may impact their home crags. 

New River Gorge National Park, West Virginia. © Hans Ho.

Regardless of the messages Access Fund leans into for particular lawmakers, the organization has always ensured its talking points are rooted in honesty and integrity.

“You have to learn what matters to people and be smart about how you communicate, just like in any relationship,” Keith says. “But you also have to be honest. We’ve definitely ruffled feathers, and we’ve sued the government. But we’ve always been honest.”

This commitment to integrity has served Access Fund well, leading to relationships that allow the organization to be a relatively heavy hitter without a corporate-sized lobbying budget.

“When we go to Capitol Hill, we have integrity and we speak the truth and we’re nice—that’s how we compel congressional members to work with us,” Murdock says. “We don’t have endless money, but what we do have is this idea that climbing and outdoor recreation is good for the American public. That’s all we have to sell, and it’s a really honest way to lobby.”

Access Fund Stays the Course

While Access Fund has built strong bipartisan relationships in Congress, it’s been equally important to pay sharp attention to every administration, regardless of party. This is especially true for their picks to lead the Departments of Interior and Agriculture—which manage nearly 60% of America’s climbing—as serious threats to climbing have emerged on the watch of both Democratic and Republican presidents. 

For example, Access Fund sued the National Park Service in 1998 (during the Clinton administration) over its decision to close Twin Sisters in the City of Rocks. Access Fund sued the federal government again in 2017 (during the Trump administration) to defend Bears Ears National Monument, and today Access Fund is putting tremendous resources into fighting moves by the National Park Service and U.S. Forest Service leaders to prohibit fixed anchors in Wilderness areas, which has all unfolded during the Biden administration.

So, no matter what happens this November, Access Fund will continue its dogged and determined work to protect climbing in the same way it has since its inception in 1991.

“Democracy is a messy business. We know that,” Murdock says. “And in order to make progress, we have to maintain relationships on both sides of the aisle. We have to root our positions in truth and integrity. As long as we do those things, we’ll keep delivering outcomes that are good for climbers. We’re not worried about supporting or criticizing a particular party; we’re concerned about climbing.”