Trump Administration Exploits Wildfires to Push Environmental Waivers, Destroy Forest Safeguards

Yesterday, Secretary of Interior Ryan Zinke published an opinion article on CNN.com with a call to Congress to leverage the Farm Bill to reopen a bi-partisan deal struck on wildfires that was already resolved in the Omnibus bill earlier this year. This article coincided with a two-day trip to California by Secretary of Interior Zinke and Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue, where they assessed damage and firefighter recovery efforts from the Camp Fire. Secretaries Zinke and Perdue continued calls for more logging and other environmental rollbacks to “manage” California’s forests, while turning a blind eye to climate change.

Kim Delfino, California Program Director, Defenders of Wildlife, issued this statement:

“California’s communities and wildlife have suffered through a brutal fire season. We need the Trump administration to focus on supporting the collaborative science-based efforts already happening in our state. What we don’t need is a politically-motivated effort to push divisive exemptions from environmental protections that scientists and forest experts have repeatedly rejected.”