Sierra Club: Rollins’s Secretarial Order a Giveaway to Logging Industry

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced a sweeping new policythat puts more than 100 million acres at risk of destruction.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins issued a Secretarial Memo declaring an unprecedented "emergency situation determination" on more than 112 million acres of the National Forest System. While the order cites wildfire risks as a rationale for the declaration of an emergency, in reality, the order seeks to drastically increase timber production in national forests and removes environmental review of logging projects.

The order is the latest move by the Trump administration to hand over control of national forests to the logging industry. In March, Donald Trump issued an executive ordercalling for increased timber production in national forests, and directing agencies to dismantle the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act in the process. That same month, he named logging industry lobbyistTom Schultz as director of the U.S. Forest Service, a position normally held by a career forestry civil servant.

In response, Anna Medema, Sierra Club's Associate Director of Legislative and Administrative Advocacy for Forests and Public Lands, released the following statement:

"Again and again, the Trump administration has shown it's more interested in boosting the bottom lines of corporate polluters than protecting our national forests and public lands. Today's order is the most egregious example yet.

"If this administration were serious about the wildfire crisis, it wouldn't chaotically fire wildlife prevention staff at the behest of Elon Musk. It wouldn't slash departmental budgets and preparedness funds. It wouldn't condition disaster aid to communities destroyed by wildfire. And it wouldn't name an industry lobbyist to oversee hundreds of millions of acres of national forests.

"What Donald Trump and his cabinet are actually interested in is using any power at their disposal to hand over control of the public lands and national forests that belong to all of us to billionaires and logging companies. The American people should not tolerate this sleight of hand from the people who have a duty to protect these landscapes for the next generation."

About the Sierra Club

The Sierra Club is America's largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with millions of members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.