Controversial Actions and Statements:

During a November 18, 2023 House Natural Resources Committee hearing, Young called the testimony of Rice University professor Doug Brinkley “garbage” and told him, “I'll call you anything I want to call you when you sit in that chair. You just be quiet.” Brinkley angered Young by expressing opposition to oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). Later in the hearing, Young compared oil extraction at ANWR to “the hair on your head. You pull one hair, you’re not going to miss it.”

On October 13, 2011, Young voted in favor of H.R. 358. The bill—labeled by pro-choice groups as the “Let Women Die Act of 2011”—proposes to effectively prohibit private insurance plans from covering abortion. It would also allow hospitals to deny treatment to women seeking abortions—even in circumstances where an abortion would be necessary to save the life of the mother. U.S. Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) slammed the bill, stating, “When the Republicans vote for this bill today, they will be voting to say that women can die on the floor of health care providers ... It's just appalling. I can't even describe to you the logic of what they are doing today.”

The House of Representatives passed Young-authored legislation in July 2011 limiting the ability of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate water quality. Young said he wrote the legislation “in response to Conoco Phillips' CD-5 issue on the North Slope, the Kensington Mine outside Juneau, and other such issues where the EPA has gotten in the way of projects that are clearly environmentally sound.” Natural Resources Defense Council attorney Steve Fleischli called the bill "the single worst assault on clean water protections in a generation.”

The House of Representatives passed a Young amendment in July 2008 that sought to exempt Alaska, Oregon, Maine and Minnesota from a grant program to protect the environmental integrity of the nation’s shores.

In March 2011, five members of the Alaska Peacemakers Militia, including leader Francis Cox, were arrested for planning to kill Alaska State Troopers and a federal judge. The group—which had stockpiled firearms and explosives—advocated the violent secession of Alaska from the United States. The Peacemakers had earlier distributed a “Letter of Declaration” which called for armed insurrection in response to the federal government’s enactment of gun control laws. Representative Young signed the letter at a Peacemakers “Open Carry” event in a Fairbanks restaurant. When asked during the event, “If any government should decide that we have to register certain of our arms or turn them in, what would your recommendation be?” Young replied, “Don't do it...I sincerely mean that. Don't turn them in.”

In January 2011, Young introduced legislation that proposed to remove the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate a large open pit mine in southwest Alaska. Opponents of the mine warned that its operation could result in the dumping of up to 10 billion tons of toxic waste into the Bristol Bay watershed. Democratic U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell also indicated that the project could harm the wild salmon population in her home state of Washington.

In 2008, a genetically distinct species of Beluga whale that live in Alaska’s Cook Inlet was designated by the federal government as an endangered species (against the protests of Young and then-Alaska Governor Sarah Palin). A 2007 count estimated that only 375 whales remained. Young disputes that the protected Belugas are actually genetically distinct from Belugas living outside of the inlet, despite clear scientific evidence to the contrary. Because of the endangered designation, commercial projects in parts of the inlet are subject to increased government regulation and possible proscription by the National Marine Fisheries Service. Young continues to oppose the endangered designation and is worried about the effects of regulation on commercial activity within the inlet.

On July 18, 2007, during a speech on the House floor about a contentious education bill, Young said, “If we continue this we'll be called biting one another, very much like the mink in my state that kill their own. There is always another day when those who bite will be killed, too. And I'm very good at that.” He then suggested that Members of Congress “have a big donnybrook [brawl] right here. I’m ready. I’m really ready … And those that bite me will be bitten back.”

In April 2007, Mark Zachares, a former top aide to Young, pled guilty to bribery charges in connection to the Jack Abramoff scandal. Zachares accepted thousands of dollars in illegal gratuities from Abramoff in exchange for using his employment on two subcommittees chaired by Young to advance Abramoff’s interests.

A 2007 guide for interns in Young’s Washington office distributed by paid staff suggested that interns allow an “A Team” of nine transportation lobbyists to “talk to whomever they want” when they called the office. When anyone else called the office, including other Members of Congress, interns were to check with the relevant staffer before putting the call through.

A 2006 article in Rolling Stone reported that Young once called environmentalists a “self-centered bunch of waffle-stomping, Harvard-graduating, intellectual idiots" who "are not Americans, never have been Americans, never will be Americans."

In 2005, Young secured a $223 million earmark for a construction project that became known as “The Bridge to Nowhere.” The bridge was designed to connect Ketchikan, Alaska (pop. 8,000) with Gravina Island (pop. 50) and would have been nearly as long as the Golden Gate Bridge and taller than the Brooklyn Bridge. At this time, a ferry ran every 30 minutes between Gravina Island and the mainland. Young also secured a $231 million earmark in the same bill for a bridge that would have connected Anchorage to Knik, Alaska (pop. 22). This bridge was to be named “Don Young’s Way.” Young openly bragged that the appropriations bill in question was stuffed “like a turkey.” When Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and others suggested that funds from the bridge projects be diverted to provide relief in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Young responded, “They can kiss my ear! That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.” In response to national outrage over the earmarks, plans to construct both bridges were canceled, but Alaska was allowed to retain the earmarked funds in the state’s general federal highway allotment fund. In 2007, Young warned then-Governor Sarah Palin, “Don’t even think of giving that money back” in response to a Congressional proposal to send some of Alaska’s funds to Minnesota in the wake of a bridge collapse in that state. An August 2007 Palin email indicated that Young continued to work behind the scenes to construct Don Young’s Way. Young was sharply criticized by commentators on both the left and right wing of politics.

During the first half of 2005, while a massive transportation bill was being authored in the Young-chaired House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, the Congressman went on a nationwide fundraising tour. Individuals, largely representing non-Alaskan transportation interests, raised $316,000 for Young, compared to $37,862 contributed by Alaskans during the same time period.

Young repeatedly used his position as chair of the House Resources Committee from 1995 to 2001 to oppose applying United States labor and immigration laws to the Northern Mariana Islands, a United States Commonwealth. A 1998 Department of Interior report documented widespread human rights abuses associated with a booming sweatshop industry on the islands (clothing made on the islands carries a “Made in USA” label). The report found that women and children immigrant workers were subjected to forced
abortions, sex slavery, and substandard pay and working conditions. Senator Frank Murkowski (R-AK) expressed outrage after personally meeting individuals forced to work without pay and engage in acts of prostitution and became a strong proponent of reform. In 1995 and again in 2000, Young allowed bills (which were unanimously passed by the U.S. Senate) that would have improved conditions for these workers to die in the House Resources Committee. Later-convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff took credit for the failure of the 2000 reform bill, saying “We then stopped it cold in the House.” Between 1994 and 2001, Abramoff was paid $11 million by the Northern Mariana Islands government to lobby in opposition of these reforms. During one 25-month period, Abramoff employees had over 120 contacts with Young or his staff concerning the Northern Mariana Islands. When term limits forced Young to step down as chair of the House Resources Committee, Abramoff wrote the Northern Mariana Island’s anti-reform governor to say, “The loss of Chairman Young's authority cannot easily be measured—or replaced ... We have lost major institutional memory and friendship.” Mark Zachares, who later worked as an aide for Young before pleading guilty to conspiracy as part of the Abramoff lobbying scandal, served as the Commonwealth’s Secretary of Labor and Immigration from 1998 to 2002—during the time that Young blocked immigration and labor reform.

On July 29, 1999, Young voted in favor of an amendment to the annual District of Columbia appropriations bill that would have banned adoption by gay parents in the District. The amendment failed 215-213.

During a 1994 Congressional hearing, Young angrily waved an 18-inch oosik (walrus penis bone) at Mollie Beattie, the first female director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.