HUFFPOST
The Biden administration on Wednesday followed through on its commitment to ban commercial logging and other development across more than 9 million acres of Alaska’s Tongass National Forest — the nation’s largest national forest.
The move reverses a Trump administration rule that gutted safeguards for the world’s largest intact temperate rainforest.
In a statement announcing the new rule, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said Tongass “is key to conserving biodiversity and addressing the climate crisis.”
“Restoring roadless protections listens to the voices of Tribal Nations and the people of Southeast Alaska while recognizing the importance of fishing and tourism to the region’s economy.”
The announcement is the latest in a decades-long tug of war over the future of the region.
President Theodore Roosevelt established Tongass as a protected national forest in 1907 and later expanded it to its current 16.7-million-acre footprint. In 2001, President Bill Clinton…
