President Trump Issues Executive Order to Boost U.S. Mineral Production
Client Alert | March 25, 2025
On March 20, 2025, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order on Immediate Measures to Increase American Mineral Production (Executive Order). The Executive Order targets key areas of mineral production in the U.S., including project permitting, land use and accelerating private and public capital investments.
Mineral Production Industry in the United States
The United States is a significant player in the global mineral production industry, contributing to the extraction and processing of a wide array of minerals essential for various sectors, including technology, energy, construction, transportation, manufacturing and defense. The U.S. boasts a diverse mineral portfolio, including coal, copper, gold, iron ore and rare earth elements, among others. The country’s mineral production is supported by a robust infrastructure, advanced technology and a regulatory framework that ensures sustainable and environmentally responsible mining practices.
At the same time, the U.S. currently relies heavily on imports of certain minerals, with at least 15 critical minerals identified in the U.S. Geological Survey’s (USGS) 2024 Mineral Commodities Summary Report as entirely net import reliant, and an additional 35 having a net import reliance greater than 50%.
In recent years, the U.S. has focused on increasing the domestic production of critical minerals to reduce dependency on foreign sources, particularly for minerals essential to high-tech industries and national security. This strategic shift is driven by the growing demand for minerals used in renewable energy technologies, electric vehicles, other clean technologies and advanced electronics.
As stated in Section 1 of the Executive Order, the U.S. was once the world’s largest producer of minerals, but federal regulatory hurdles have eroded the country’s mineral production. The Executive Order aims to address some of the obstacles to, and introduce measures to facilitate, the growth of mineral production in the U.S.
Critical Minerals
While various regulatory bodies and policy makers have issued differing definitions and lists of critical minerals, the Executive Order specifically applies to:
- 50 minerals, elements, substances or materials designated as critical by the Secretary of the Interior, acting through the Director of USGS, in the 2022 Final List of Critical Minerals, including aluminum, antimony, cobalt, graphite, lithium, magnesium, manganese, nickel, palladium, platinum, titanium, zinc and various other rare earth minerals;
- additional minerals specifically named in the Executive Order, including uranium, copper, potash and gold; and
- any other element, compound or material as may be determined by the Chair of the National Energy Dominance Council (NEDC) established by President Trump on February 14, 2025 and currently chaired by Interior Secretary Doug Bergum.
These minerals play different roles in the U.S. energy and national security infrastructure. For instance:
- Copper is the second most widely used material in weapons platforms. As the copper industry warns of a looming supply gap, the inability to source copper could cause weapon system production delays and disruptions for the Department of Defense. Copper is also heavily used in renewable energy technologies and in the development of data centers, with industry specialists estimating that between 330,000 tons and 420,000 tons of copper will be used in data centers by 2030.[1]
- Uranium, a mineral that the U.S. has more recently imported from Russia, as well as Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Canada and Australia, will be critical for the development of nuclear power.
- Potash has historically been imported from other countries (including Canada, Russia, Belarus and China) and is used heavily in the production of fertilizers.
- The domestic production of antimony, a mineral used in missiles and munitions as well as semiconductors, declined following the closure of the Stibnite Gold Mine in 1997; China subsequently banned antimony exports to the U.S. in 2024.
Measures to Increase Domestic Mineral Production
The Executive Order targets several key areas of mineral mining, processing, refining and smelting that could give a boost to the industry by streamlining permitting processes, granting land and mobilizing capital.
- Identification of Priority Projects and Streamlining Permitting. The Executive Order introduces a range of measures to expedite the permitting process for priority projects and address regulatory bottlenecks.
- The Executive Order directs the head of each executive department and agency involved in the mineral production permitting process and the Chair of the NEDC to identify priority mineral production projects currently under review that can be approved immediately and take steps to issue approvals and permits to such priority projects.
- Additionally, the Chair of the NEDC and relevant agencies are directed to submit to the Executive Director of the Permitting Council mineral production projects to be considered as transparency projects on the Permitting Dashboard. The Executive Director of the Permitting Council is directed to publish selected projects and establish schedules for expedited review.
- Finally, the Chair of the NEDC and relevant agencies are directed to solicit industry feedback on regulatory bottlenecks and other recommended strategies to expedite mineral production in the U.S.
- Land Use for Mineral Projects. The Executive Order introduces measures to designate federal lands with known mineral deposits and reserves for mineral production and lease such lands to private investors.
- The Executive Order directs the Secretary of the Interior to identify and provide to the Assistants to the President for Economic Policy and for National Security Affairs a list of all federal lands known to hold mineral deposits and reserves. Such areas are to be designated primarily for mineral production and mining related purposes by the Secretary of the Interior, and land use plans under the Federal Land Policy and Management Act must be amended for such areas to provide for mineral production and ancillary uses.
- The Secretaries of Defense, the Interior, Agriculture and Energy are further directed to identify federal lands managed by their respective agencies that may be suitable for leasing or development pursuant to 10 U.S.C. 2667 (Leases of Non-Excess Property of Military Departments and Defense Agencies) or 42 U.S.C. 7256 (Leases with Public Agencies and Private Organizations), or any other applicable authorities, for the construction and operation of private commercial mineral production facilities and to provide a list of such lands to the Assistants to the President for Economic Policy and for National Security Affairs, and to the Chair of the NEDC. The Secretaries of Defense and Energy will be authorized to lease such lands to private investors as authorized by 10 U.S.C. 2667 or 42 U.S.C. 7256(a), or using any other authority they deem appropriate, to advance the installation of commercial mineral production facilities either through new construction or modification of existing structures.
- Additionally, the Secretaries of Defense, Energy and Agriculture, the Administrator of the Small Business Administration and the heads of certain other agencies are directed to ensure that private parties that enter into leasing or other commercial agreements to develop mineral production can utilize as many favorable terms and conditions as are available under public assistance programs for such purposes.
- Acceleration of Private and Public Capital Investment. The Executive Order introduces measures to mobilize both public funds and private capital toward mineral production.
- The Executive Order directs the Secretary of Defense to utilize the National Security Capital Forum as a platform to match private capital with commercially viable domestic mineral production projects.
- The Executive Order delegates certain authorities of the President under sections 301, 302 and 303 of the Defense Production Act (DPA) (50 U.S.C. 4533) to create and expand domestic industrial base capabilities essential to the national defense to the Secretary of Defense and to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the United States International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) who may use such authorities for domestic production and facilitation of strategic resources to advance domestic mineral production in the U.S. It is anticipated that the Secretary of Defense (through the Department of Defense investment authorities (including DPA) and the Department of Defense Office of Strategic Capital) and the CEO of the DFC will use this authority to establish a mineral production fund for domestic investments executed by the DFC.
- The Executive Order directs: (i) the President of the Export-Import Bank to release recommended program guidance for the use of mineral and mineral production financing tools authorized under the Supply Chain Resiliency Initiative to secure United States offtake of global raw mineral feedstock for domestic minerals processing, as well as under the Make More in America Initiative to support domestic mineral production; (ii) the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Industrial Base Policy to convene buyers of minerals and work towards an announced request for bids to supply critical minerals; and (iii) the Administrator of the Small Business Administration to prepare recommendations for legislation to enhance private-public capital activities to support financings to domestic small businesses engaged in mineral production.
- Finally, in order to ease the administrative burden for recipients of government loans, loan guarantees, grants or equity investments or producers under offtake arrangements with relevant agencies, the Executive Order rescinds the requirement to submit disclosures required by Regulation S-K part 1300 to such agencies.
Next Steps
The Executive Order has introduced a wide range of measures that can streamline the permitting process for mineral production and help mobilize government funds and private capital to boost the mineral exploration, mining, processing, refining and smelting industries in the United States. As the Executive Order provides for aggressive deadlines for various agencies to implement these measures, we expect mineral producers will move quickly to utilize the new opportunities created by the Executive Order, including seeking faster permitting for priority projects and easier access to land for mineral production.
In the meantime, mineral producers should consider engaging in discussions with relevant agencies to take advantage of these new opportunities: (i) ensure that development projects that are currently under review are designated as priority projects and offered fast-track permitting; (ii) secure land designated for mineral production in order to develop new mineral production projects; and (iii) secure other public and private sources of funding for new mineral production projects, including government loans and working capital, DPA funding and DFC and Export-Import Bank financing.
[1] On February 25, 2025, President Trump signed another Executive Order to address the threat to national security from imports of copper, directing the Secretary of Commerce to initiate an investigation to determine the effects on national security of imports of copper and, in consultation with the Secretaries of Defense, the Interior and Energy and with the heads of other relevant agencies, to evaluate the national security risks associated with copper import dependency.
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