01/20/2025 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 01/20/2025 20:34
Ian Brickey, [email protected]
WASHINGTON, D.C. -In a flurry of executive orders declaring a "national energy emergency" and aiming to "unleash American energy," Donald Trump acted to slash environmental protections in the Tongass National Forest.
The order revokes an order from the Biden Administration restoring protections for the Tongass, one of the country's last remaining old-growth forests, and reinstates a much-criticized 2020 rule from the first Trump Administration opening vast swaths of old-growth to industrial logging. These actions jeopardize the subsistence culture of Indigenous communities, the forest's role in fighting the climate crisis, and imperiled wildlife.
The Tongass is the traditional and current homelands of Tsimshian, Tlingit, and Haida. It contains some of the last remaining temperate old-growth rainforest in the world and is a hub for tourism, fishing, and outdoor recreation in Southeast Alaska. It is also America's largest forest storehouse of carbon.
Old-growth forests are powerful absorbers of carbon and are key tools in taking on climate change. They also provide critical wildlife habitat, filter clean drinking water for communities, and provide outdoor recreation opportunities.
In response, Athan Manuel, director of Sierra Club's Lands Protection Program, released the following statement:
"The Tongass is one of the country's last remaining old-growth forests, but Donald Trump and his allies want to give it away to corporate interests. That means giving up our clean air and clean water to pad the bottom lines of big timber companies. These actions put America's wettest and wildest national forest at risk, and could be an opening salvo against forests across the country. Trump wants to chop down the legacy we leave future generations."
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.