"The Trump administration wrongly tweaked a grant process when forwarding $2 million in funds to the state of Alaska as officials pushed to open the state’s Tongass National Forest up to more logging, a government watchdog found.

In September of last year, the U.S. Forest Service gave $2 million to Alaska to help it prepare an environmental analysis of proposed logging in one of the nation’s largest old-growth forests.

The problem, Democratic lawmakers argued, is that pot of money was designed to help communities prevent and suppress wildfires."

Rebecca Beitsch reports for The Hill December 18, 2020. [2]