Trump intends to reopen the Tongass National Forest to logging. But environmentalists and tribal governments envision a more equitable and sustainable future for Southeast Alaska’s economy.
Stretching across nearly 17 million acres, the Tongass National Forest in Southeast Alaska is the largest intact temperate rainforest in the world. In 2001, President Bill Clinton signed the Roadless Area Conservation Rule, protecting 58.5 million acres of national forest land — including more than half of the Tongass — from roads and logging.
For nearly two decades, Alaska’s “drill, baby, drill” leadership chafed at these restrictions. When Donald Trump was first elected, they saw an opening and encouraged the new administration to reconsider the Roadless Rule.
Southeast tribal governments, who opposed fully lifting the protections, say the new rulemaking process failed to meaningfully engage with them.
“It became clear at the very end … that the game had already been fixed,” Bob Starbard, then administrator of the Hoonah Indian Association, told regional radio consortium CoastAlaska in 2020.
Despite overwhelming opposition from tribes, fishermen, environmental groups and concerned citizens, Trump rolled back Roadless protections in 2020, opening up more than 9 million acres of the Tongass to logging.
You’d think, for so great an environmental sacrifice, that the Tongass would supply loggers with easy profits. It doesn’t.
The forest’s remote location and mountainous terrain make it extremely difficult to extract and transport timber. The Forest Service builds roads for the logging companies, which can cost up to $500,000 per mile in federal funds. In many cases, the roads are not open to the public. According to Taxpayers for Common Sense, the Forest Service lost $1.7 billion supporting Tongass timber sales between 1980 and 2019, cushioning industry from the true cost of doing business at taxpayers’ expense.
In January 2023, President Joe Biden reinstated the Roadless Rule. The Tongass was safe — for two years. With Trump returning to office, politicians and private companies will redouble their push to exchange one of the world’s most effective carbon sinks for cash. But the relationship between the Tongass and the communities it sustains has always extended beyond the pendulum swing of Democratic and Republican priorities.
Caroleine James is a reporter, illustrator and In These Times intern based in Salt Lake City, Utah.
