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I am a former USDA Forest Service employee, a backpacker, hiker, and frequent user of public lands, and I am vehemently opposed to rescinding the 2001 Roadless Rule.
A USDA FS study by Sean Healy, "Long-term forest health implications of roadlessness" in 2020 from the Rocky Mountain Research Station found that increasing roads does not increase fire management, and spreads invasive plant species. The taking away of the Roadless Rule will also encroach on Native American sovereignty and access to their ancestral lands, including sacred sites, and have countless negative reverberations. It will also result in long, costly lawsuits - and I would know, as I was an employee on the most litigated National Forest in the United States of America, the Helena National Forest. As it is, more road building would mean more road maintenance, and per the USDA FS 2026 Q2 Fiscal Report, there is already over $6 billion dollars of deferred maintenance on our roads alone - and a backlog of over $11.4 billion dollars of deferred maintenance in total.
The Center for Biological Diversity released a report in August 2026 that notes that rescinding the Roadless Rule would put almost 7.5 million acres of endangered animal's habitat at risk, alongside 1,500 miles of creeks, streams, and rivers, at risk for contamination by sediment and other pollutants. National Forest water sources provide drinking water for millions of Americans. I love being a Montanan, hiking on National Forest lands in one of the most intact wilderness states in the lower 48, sharing my world with wolverines, grizzly bears, wolves, and countless other species, flora and fauna alike, who would be threatened and stressed by road incursion into their habitat.
Americans do not have much in terms of patrimony to be proud of. We do not have affordable healthcare. We do not have affordable college, or childcare, or family leave, and our federal minimum wage is still $7.25. In Montana, we have had to fight for so long to regain clean water, clean soil, and a healthy environment after decades of intensive resource extraction from mining, timber harvesting, and other industries gutted our land and water. What we do have is our public lands, and our access to them for not just this time but for all time - and not for greed, for enriching private corporations, but for preservation, public use, and for the flora and fauna we are so lucky to live amongst.