Old Growth Forest Policy Made at the 19th Hole

Environment Policy Brief #180 | Todd J. Broadman | May 5, 2025

Through an Executive Order issued March 1, 2025, there is to be an expansion of American timber production that meets goals to achieve “sound forest management, reduce time to deliver timber, and decrease timber supply uncertainty.” Approximately 100 million acres, the equivalent of 60% of our national forests, are to be within earshot of a chainsaw. In so doing, the Trump administration declares this a “new era” in national forest management. Legally protected forest land and parts of old growth forest are slated be part of the expanded production.

Though the timber production order is framed as an emergency, that definition is not met under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), nor does it follow the decision process as defined by Congress – only the deputized branch that regulates a particular land parcel has authority to begin the process of opening or closing a forest to logging. Those details though, are not stopping the executive office from an attempt to sidestep environmental laws as well as declare emergency fire risks.

The U.S. Forest Service (USFS) falls under the Department of Agriculture, and its Secretary, Brooke Rollins, and is enthusiastically following Trump’s directives in declaring a forest health emergency – one that spans 80% of forests managed by the USFS. She aims to increase logging in national forests by some 25%. Meanwhile, there was an attempt to fire over 3,000 USFS employees. That too made its way from the Oval Office to Brooke Rollins. (That order was overturned recently by the Merit Systems Protection Board and those employees are reinstated with backpay).

Underlying the Executive Order is the belief that job creation, economic growth, and national self-reliance must be the primary considerations in forest management policy. In addition to the imposition of this value system, the safety of Americans has been woven into the justification in so far as increased logging reduces fire risk. As with oil and other natural resources the assumption is that there is an “abundance” of trees, “more than adequate to meet our domestic timber production needs.” In that sense, national security adds further implied support. The Order goes as to say that leaving forests wild, and not acting to log, has actually degraded fish and wildlife habitats.

There is agreement amongst forestry scientists that selective logging, particularly in the West, can improve overall environmental health. Due to decades of logging and fire suppression, where there used to be millions of acres of old-growth trees, there are now dense stands of smaller trees, brush and other tinder. There has been an increase in insect infestations and droughts.

As with drilling deep for oil, the economics of harvesting smaller trees often does not pay off. In the timber industry, forest management practices designed to reduce the quantity, arrangement, and continuity of combustible materials such as dead wood, underbrush, and small trees, is known as “fuel treatment.” And fuel treatment combined with the opening-up of tracts with larger trees could change this equation and make it economically feasible for logging companies, and even then, only if lumber firms have employees and mills capable of these larger harvesting operations.

Industry lobbyists like the Federal Forest Resource Coalition (FFRC), are thrilled with the initiative, and say they want to see logging on federal lands double. “The President’s Executive Order rightly recognizes that our National Forests are undermanaged and can do a lot more to meet the demand for lumber in the US,” they said, echoing the justifications Trump deployed. In addition to the FFRC, the American Forest Resource Council (AFRC), a corporate lobbyist for the lumber industry in western states claimed the directive was “long-overdue” and said the timber industry is poised to contribute to “economic revitalization.” In line with industry sentiment, in a memo to USFS field managers, Secretary Rollins, instructed the field to disregard National Environmental Policy Act regulations and to fast-track timber production.

Former timber industry (Idaho Forest Group) executive and Trump loyalist, Tom Schultz, was recently appointed US Forest Service Chief.

Aside from legal challenges, there are practical hurdles that must be overcome in order for increased logging to take place. There is a severe labor shortage in the industry. In Oregon, the Malheur mill closed its doors due to a labor shortage, prompting Bruce Dausavage, President of Ochoco Lumber to remark: “The way we currently stand, I don’t believe the President’s procedures will help.” The labor shortage is not confined to the lumber mills. There are shortfalls of skilled foresters, biologists, and other USFS workers who create and manage complex timber projects. This at a time when the Trump administration has and will continue to cut staff.

One of the prominent issues that will be challenged in court and one that directly impacts lands open to logging is the ESA and its definition of “harm.” The term as written includes habitat protection. The administration contends that harm ought to be defined as “affirmative act directed immediately against a particular animal,” rather than indirect harm coming from habitat destruction. Dave Owen, an environmental law professor at the University of California, San Francisco, says that the “shift here would be to say that just habitat modification that is detrimental to a species, even if the detriment is fairly direct, is not encompassed within the word ‘harm’.” On this issue of what constitutes harm, Noah Greenwald of Biological Diversity says, “There’s just no way to protect animals and plants from extinction without protecting the places they live, yet the Trump administration is opening the floodgates to immeasurable habitat destruction.”

ANALYSIS

New protections were granted to “carbon-rich” trees in national forests – those tree stands more than a century old – under the Biden administration. Rollins predecessor Tom Vilsack had a very different view of our natural inheritance. “At the end of the day, it will protect not just the forests, but also the culture and heritage connected to the forests,” he said. According to Andy Stahl, executive director at the nonprofit Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, the most valuable timber are old-growth trees located in wet rainforests of the Pacific Northwest. A three decades long agreement halted almost all logging of these trees. Industry watchers are following this closely to see if the administration is able to make any change at all to current protections.

In order to make good on his political promises, Trump has created an emergency in our national forests. Many experts contend that this is an attempt to confuse the public, similar to the emergency invoked to locate and deport immigrants. This follows a pattern of apply emergency powers to seize control of decision-making from the Oval Office. As Rollins directed, another ploy will be for the USFS to shorten their review process and the pushing through of approvals. These moves though are sure to be litigated.

To enhance the economics of domestic timber sales, Trump has imposed a 25% tariff on Canadian and Mexican lumber imports, a move applauded by U.S. lumber companies as a way to protect domestic producers from foreign competition and unfair trade practices. The President has requested a plan from the Secretary of the Interior and Agriculture with a target number for the annual amount of timber (in millions of board feet) per year to be sold from Federal lands managed by the BLM and USFS. In his gusto to cut down trees he asks that these agencies “revise or rescind” all existing regulations that would prevent attainment of the target.

A seasoned attorney in environmental and natural resource law, Murray Feldman, a partner at Holland & Hart LLP in Boise, Idaho, called this Executive Order an “aspirational statement.” He pointed out that there is no emergency to be substantiated. Emergency declarations normally apply to human health risks and this order falls far short of demonstrating that kind of risk. This is yet another change that is rightly to be made in the legislative branch of government, not the executive. Feldman explains that “If the Administration wants to remake timber policy on the federal lands, it needs to go the branch that has plenary authority over those lands and work there to implement any change it may seek. It cannot do so simply by issuing an Executive Order.”

Like so many other Executive Orders, this one was done by subverting Constitutional authority. As with the deportation of immigrants, Trump knows the courts will rule against him and wants action to take place before litigation begins and judges rule to stay the Order. And although there is merit in thinning certain forest stands to improve forest health and enhance fire prevention, his specific “board feet” targets make plain a different agenda. The judicial branch is sure to see through this charade.

USRESIST  Resources:

https://amforest.org/ is a regional trade association whose purpose is to advocate for sustained yield timber harvests on public timberlands throughout the West.

https://climate.mit.edu/ informs and empowers the public on this complex issue of climate change.

https://elpc.org/  is the Midwest’s leading environmental legal advocacy organization.