Indigenous Peoples and the Justice40 Screening Tool: Lessons from EJSCREEN

The Biden-Harris administration has focused considerably on environmental justice (EJ), including the Justice40 Initiative and renewed White House Council on Native American Affairs. This work has included financial investments in Tribal economies, prioritizing Tribal health care, and major Tribal infrastructure investments as part of current passed bills and active proposed legislation. The Justice40 Initiative aims at delivering at least 40% of the benefits of federal investments in climate and energy to disadvantaged communities, including many Tribes. The recent White House Tribal Nations Summit Progress Report discusses Justice40 and its potential benefits related to climate, energy, transportation, housing, pollution, and infrastructure. The report leaves open the question of how Tribes will benefit from Justice40. Currently, the White House Council on Environmental Quality is developing a new Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool for identifying disadvantaged communities who qualify for Justice40 investments. Executive Order 14008 references how this new screening tool should be based on lessons learned from EJSCREEN. For Tribes, however, EJSCREEN does not adequately represent infrastructure and other EJ needs relevant to the goals outlined in Justice40. In this article, we will discuss issues with EJSCREEN that must be addressed in the forthcoming screening tool that was released in prototype form for public comment on February 18, 2022. Major gaps in EJSCREEN include ones in data regarding mining, energy extraction, cultural landscapes, meaningful spatial boundaries, and qualitative data in general, as well as the fundamental issue of engaging with Tribes. These concerns must be addressed if Tribes are to be accurately represented by the tool such that they may fully benefit from Justice40 investments. However, there may be ethics and sovereignty issues that will make some data unavailable at the national scale, or shortages in the United States and Tribal capacity to coordinate the formation of data sets.