Green Climate v. Rollins

An environmental organization filed a lawsuit in the federal district court for the District of Columbia challenging Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins’s April 3, 2025 Memorandum 1078-006, “Increasing Timber Production and Designating an Emergency Situation on National Forest System Lands.” The organization alleged that the Memorandum made an “Emergency Situation Determination” (ESD) under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that authorized the harvesting of more than 112 million acres of National Forest System lands at a discount price and directed the Forest Service to implement timber harvesting on such lands. The Memorandum implemented Executive Order 14225, “Immediate Expansion of American Timber Production,” which President Trump issued on March 1, 2025. The complaint alleged that the actions authorized by the Memorandum “will lead to increased logging activity on millions of acres of federal forest land, with direct and indirect environmental impacts including loss of wildlife habitat, increased carbon emissions, soil erosion, water quality degradation, and impacts to endangered species.” The complaint asserted that the ESD and Memorandum and actions taken under them are contrary to law and violate the Administrative Procedure Act.