There is no better time to claim land than when the public is focused on war in Gaza and expanding wars in the Middle East and Africa. While it is not ratified yet, the US has laid claim to over one million square kilometers to the US boundaries. If this did make it to congress, it would bring the attention the US does not want while they are making new maps for their newly acquired land.
Where can there be land available to the US to take? The ocean. The continental shelf in the Arctic all the way down to Mexico.
Why? For mining.
Land annexation always equates with resource extraction and land destruction. The goal is always to use the land for its resources, never to protect the land.
The US, like many other countries that benefit from colonialism, seeks to mine resources and fuels from areas out of sight, like the continental shelf the US just took, then the public does not see the impact because it is out of sight and out of mind. The same can be said for all countries mining for resources in Africa and exploiting the people and the land for their own profits, but ultimately decimating the land and the people.
Unfortunately science and exploration is used as a front to make this annexation of land and resources look as benign as possible. Why would scientists search for resources and map these resources if it is not to extract these resources? It’s manipulative and delegitimizes scientific research when the truth is that all of the data that was collected on the land was only for the intent to use these resources.
IF the US declares it protected, than that is a different story, but it is apparent what the intent of the use of the continental shelf will be, and that is to mine it.
Fish populations, globally, are declining. Snow crabs are almost completely gone. This extension of US territory lines directly affects the snow crabs habitat.
When the US begins depleting this region of the ocean, there will be greater impacts on fish and the ocean as a whole.
It also is incredibly deceptive to simply acquire new land and not state it to the world in the UN and to have this land annexation ratified in Congress so that everyone is aware of these actions. Not doing so paints this as devious and lacks sovereignty.
To read more about the land the US annexed:
Earth: The US just expanded its territory by one million square kilometers