Trump administration bypasses environmental reviews to fast-track logging in illinois’ last national forest

Environmental advocates are sounding the alarm as the Forest Service uses administrative shortcuts to accelerate logging projects in America’s national forests, including Illinois’ only such protected area. The controversy centers on a nearly 70-acre timber sale in the Shawnee National Forest, where activists say the agency deliberately obscured public participation and skirted environmental protections.

Sam Stearns, founder of Friends of Bell Smith Spring, discovered the Forest Service had renamed the “McCormick Oak-Hickory Restoration Project” to “V-Plow” when advertising the timber sale, making it nearly impossible for concerned citizens to track. By the time environmentalists located the project, they had just one week left in what used to be a 45-day public comment period. “Never in the history of this planet has a forest been logged back to health,” said the 71-year-old activist, who has since filed a lawsuit to stop the operation.

The Shawnee case reflects a nationwide trend under President Trump’s executive orders directing the Forest Service to fast-track timber harvests using “categorical exclusions” – regulatory shortcuts that bypass full environmental reviews. These exemptions, originally intended for minor projects like trail maintenance, are now being applied to major logging operations across the country. Conservation groups report similar cases in Oregon’s Mount Hood National Forest and Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, where the agency is borrowing categorical exclusions from other federal departments to expedite timber sales while limiting public oversight of projects affecting endangered species and critical ecosystems.