Biden ‘Spikes’ Alaska’s Timber Industry with Tongass Actions

July 15, 2021

Look no further to Joe Biden’s nomination of admitted eco-terrorist Tracy Stone-Manning to head the Bureau of Land Management to know that he values politics over safe timber management.  After all, Stone-Manning’s affinity for spiking trees – a practice she wrote a letter touting on behalf of radical eco group Earth First! – shows her deep-seated disregard for loggers and their safety.

Biden’s continued championing of Stone-Manning’s nomination is mind-boggling.  So, too, is his announcement this morning that our nation’s largest national forest is now completely off-limits to commercial forest management.  The Tongass National Forest in Alaska’s southeast panhandle has seen industrialized timber harvesting for decades, even as previous administrations battled over federal regulations related to accessing the lands.

But this morning, Biden effectively put an end to the jobs of hundreds of loggers throughout the area, when his administration placed protections on almost the entire 9 million acres that had been previously accessible.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, while announcing the orders, tried to play up the region’s other industries (tourism, fishing) as being available for the logging community to transition to.

But ask any of the 11,000 workers who spent years building the Keystone XL Pipeline; changing careers – especially when promised jobs are still invisible six months later – isn’t easy nor guaranteed.

Spiking trees?  Worth a plumb federal job.  Managing trees?  Not with this administration.