1. United States
2. Calif.
3. Letter

Vote NO on S. 1462, the Fix Our Forests Act. This bill was drafted in 2023 for a Forest Service that no longer exists. The agency has already lost more than 25% of its staff with decades of experience, and more will be lost with the disastrous reorganization this administration is trying to push. Today it's run by a logging executive, supervised by a billionaire whom the Forest Service once tried to get a restraining order against, and overseen by a Secretary who has already declared an "emergency" across 112 million acres — 59 percent of the entire National Forest System — to bypass environmental review. All decisions about wildfire mitigation should be made by forest scientists based on research at the individual forest level. The research capacity needed to implement this well is currently being dismantled in the USFS restructuring. FOFA would make science-based management impossible by tripling categorical exclusions to 10,000 acres, creating 250,000-acre logging zones exempt from review, gutting Endangered Species Act protections, and slashing the statute of limitations from six years to 150 days. Wildfire mitigation can be done without giving away our forest lands. The bill sits on the Senate calendar as No. 212, ready for a floor vote. Block any unanimous consent motion and vote NO.