Trump’s Forest Service Overhaul: Cuts, Layoffs, and Wildfire Risk

President Trump’s overhaul of the U.S. Forest Service, announced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture on March 31, 2026, moves the agency’s headquarters from Washington, D.C., to Salt Lake City, eliminates all nine regional offices, closes 57 of 77 research facilities, and replaces the regional structure with 15 state directors reporting to national leadership. It lands on top of thousands of staff losses from 2025, a proposed 65% cut to the agency’s budget, and a separate plan to move wildland firefighting into a new agency at the Department of the Interior. The Forest Service manages 193 million acres of national forests and grasslands, and the changes touch nearly every part of how that work gets done.

What the Reorganization Actually Changes

The headquarters move sends roughly 260 D.C.-area positions to Salt Lake City and keeps about 130 in Washington, with completion targeted for summer 2027.¹² Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins called it “essential action that will improve our core mission of managing our forests while saving taxpayer dollars and boosting employee recruitment,” and Deputy Secretary Stephen Vaden pointed to Salt Lake City’s “modernized facilities, reasonable cost of living, proximity to an international airport, and more family-focused way of life.”³ Officials note that nearly 90% of Forest Service lands lie west of the Mississippi.

Below the headquarters, the old nine-region structure is gone. Fifteen state directors will each oversee one or more states, filling roles through competitive Senior Executive Service hiring rather than political appointment.⁴ Sixteen state offices span the country, some covering large groupings: the Mid-Atlantic/New England State Office in Warren, Pennsylvania, oversees 13 states. Six Operations Service Centers — in Placerville, California; Fort Collins, Colorado; Athens, Georgia; Missoula, Montana; Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Madison, Wisconsin — take on the administrative and technical work regional offices used to handle.³ Three regional offices close outright: Portland, Oregon (Region 6); Atlanta (Region 8); and Milwaukee (Region 9), with staff reassigned to hubs in Utah, Colorado, or New Mexico.² The Forest Service expects the transition to unfold over the 12 months after the March 31 announcement.

USDA presents the state-based model as an expansion of partnerships with state governments, counties, and tribes under tools like the Good Neighbor Authority, which lets states carry out management work on federal land. Since 2014, at least 38 states have initiated over 490 projects under that authority.⁵ Whether state agencies have the staffing and funding to absorb more of the work is an open question, and Utah’s selection drew scrutiny given that state legislators have pushed to transfer federal lands to state control and Senator Mike Lee has proposed selling federal land.⁶

Research Stations and the Science Program

The agency is closing 57 of its 77 research facilities across 31 states — roughly three-quarters of its network.⁷⁴³

The Forest Service says the closures target “under-utilized or vacant” facilities, that “closing a facility does not mean the work stops,” and that no experimental forests and ranges are being shuttered and no scientific positions or research programs are being formally eliminated. Officials cite a $3 billion deferred maintenance backlog and approximately $37 million less in congressional appropriations for fiscal year 2026 than the prior year.⁴

Scientists and outside groups argue the closures cut deeper than the facility count suggests. Much of the affected work is long-term ecological monitoring — wildfire behavior, climate impacts on forests, invasive species, watershed health — with some studies dating to the early 1900s and not easily replicated.⁸ Facilities at risk include the Institute of Pacific Islands Forestry in Hawaii, which studies rapid ohia death and invasive species, and the Pacific Wildland Fire Sciences Lab in Seattle, which does wildfire and smoke forecasting.⁹ Many stations are co-located with universities, sharing labs and mentorship pipelines that closure would sever.⁷ Scientists told NPR they would quit rather than relocate, and warned that running hyperlocal field studies from Fort Collins is not workable for much of the work.¹⁰ Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility said the closures would push the agency toward a “one-size-fits-all” approach across ecosystems ranging from eastern hardwoods to arid southwestern brush.¹¹

Budget Cuts

The physical restructuring is arriving alongside proposed cuts of a different order of magnitude. Senator Martin Heinrich says the fiscal year 2026 budget request proposed cutting overall Forest Service funding by 65%.¹²¹³¹⁰

Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz told a Senate hearing in June 2025 that “states would step up” to fund research the federal government drops.¹³ Scientists responded that routine monitoring of soil, air, and water quality is not the type of work that wins competitive grants from bodies like the National Science Foundation.⁸ Congress holds the final say over appropriations, and bipartisan opposition to eliminating research funding has been reported. Even so, critics point out that if the facility closures happen while the R&D account is under threat, the labs and staff needed to conduct restored research may no longer exist.

Workforce Impact

The Forest Service entered the reorganization already smaller. The Department of Government Efficiency oversaw workforce reductions estimated at 3,400 Forest Service positions during 2025 through layoffs, deferred resignations, and early retirements.¹⁴ Secretary Rollins told Congress USDA as a whole shed more than 15,000 employees in the prior year.¹⁵

The agency says about 500 employees, roughly 1.5% of its 30,000-person workforce, will need to relocate, and that “a job for every existing employee” is available for those willing to accept reassignment. Buyouts of up to $25,000 and early retirement are on offer for those who prefer to leave. The National Federation of Federal Employees, which represents Forest Service workers, puts the number affected far higher: roughly 6,500 employees touched by the headquarters move and another 2,700 by research center closures.¹⁶

The Bureau of Land Management’s 2019 headquarters relocation to Grand Junction, Colorado, offers a recent precedent. The administration at the time expected 328 employees to move; 41 did. The move cost taxpayers $28 million, and former Wilderness Society director Tracy Stone-Manning described the outcome as a loss of “irreplaceable institutional knowledge.” The Biden administration later returned many senior positions to Washington while keeping a smaller western office.¹⁷

Wildfire Preparedness

The reorganization is unfolding as record-low snowpack and drought across the West raise fears about the fire season, and after a year of cuts that have measurably reduced operational capacity.

In February 2025, the administration laid off roughly 700 employees who held “red cards” certifying them to work on fire crews. Many were later rehired. Separately, about 1,400 to 1,600 red card holders who had left through deferred resignations or early retirements were asked to volunteer to return for the 2025 fire season, and only 85 accepted.¹⁸ A bipartisan group of Colorado lawmakers urged Secretary Rollins to reinstate roughly 3,000 fired red card holders before peak wildfire season in spring 2025.¹⁹

Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, drawing on the Forest Service’s own tracking data, found that hazardous fuels reduction work — the thinning and prescribed burning meant to prevent catastrophic wildfires — was down 38% through the first nine months of 2025 against the four-year average. Idaho had completed 21% of typical treatment acreage; California, 34%. Internal data cited by ProPublica showed 27% of wildland firefighting positions vacant as of late July 2025.²⁰ Trail maintenance fell to its lowest level in 15 years, with a 22% drop in miles maintained.²¹

The Forest Service maintains that the reorganization does not affect field-based operational firefighters and that its fire and aviation management structure stays in place.³ A separate initiative complicates that assurance. In June 2025 President Trump signed an executive order directing the consolidation of wildland firefighting operations from the Forest Service and several Interior Department bureaus into a new U.S. Wildland Fire Service housed at Interior. Interior began transitioning its own firefighting personnel in February 2026; Forest Service firefighters have not yet been transferred.²² Critics warn that separating fire suppression from land management, fuels mitigation, and recreation would hollow out the agency’s core operations.

Legal Questions and Congressional Response

A key legal fact sits under all of this: USDA’s fiscal year 2026 appropriations bill explicitly blocked the department from reorganizing or relocating offices without congressional authorization.¹⁵ Chief Schultz told Congress the agency consulted the Office of General Counsel and was advised it has authority to proceed.¹³ The NFFE union called the reorganization a “breach of the Constitution” and a potential violation of the Anti-Deficiency Act, and asked Congress to halt reorganization activity, hold oversight hearings, and direct a Government Accountability Office investigation.²³

On April 24, 2026, Senator Angus King and 33 other senators wrote to Deputy Secretary Vaden warning that the plan “may lead to additional capacity and workforce reductions” and demanded answers by May 1 on the relocation timeline, criteria for closing research stations, and effects on timber sales and recreation permits.²⁴ In the House, Representative Chellie Pingree, the top Democrat on the relevant Appropriations subcommittee, said the Forest Service had left lawmakers “in the dark” and questioned the legality of proceeding without authorization. Subcommittee Chairman Mike Simpson, a Republican from Idaho, took a more measured line: “This might be the best idea since sliced bread, I don’t know. But there are just a whole bunch of questions I need answered.”¹⁵ Republican Representative Ryan Zinke of Montana backed the move, saying “moving things out West, I think, is important, because most of the issues are in the West.”¹³

USDA solicited public comment between August 1 and September 30, 2025, following an initial reorganization proposal from July 24, 2025.²⁵ More than 80% of roughly 14,000 comments opposed the plan. USDA’s own summary acknowledged concerns that the move and budget cuts “could compromise ecological management, public access, and employee morale,” and tribal representatives warned that mass relocations would “destroy irreplaceable knowledge about Treaty rights, forest conditions, and working relationships.”¹⁷ The final plan kept most elements of the original.

Where Things Stand

As of mid-2026, implementation is in its early phase. Individual assignment letters for employees required to relocate were expected in May or June 2026.² Voluntary separation incentives and early retirement are being offered.¹⁶ No court has blocked the reorganization, though observers note that the absence of congressional authorization could support legal challenges.⁶ The NFFE says the agency has a legal duty to bargain over the impact and implementation of the restructuring before workers are forced to relocate, be reassigned, or separated, and that bargaining is running in parallel.²⁶ Cost estimates for the relocations are still being developed; Secretary Rollins told Senator Heinrich the department is “still working on” them.²⁷

1
The Hill. Trump US Forest Service HQ Salt Lake City Utah
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Government Executive. Forest Service to Move HQ Out of DC, Shutter Regional Offices in Sweeping Overhaul
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USDA. USDA Prioritizing Common Sense Forest Management, Moves Forest Service Headquarters to Salt Lake City
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U.S. Forest Service. Forest Service Reorganization
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National Association of State Foresters. Good Neighbor Authority
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Stateline. Forest Service Shake-Up Will Boost States’ Role, but Even Supporters Have Concerns
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The New York Times. Forest Service Research Stations
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Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. Trump Administration to Close Three-Quarters of Forest Service Research Stations
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NPR. President Trump Is Taking Aim at Forest and Wildfire Research Just as the West Is Poised to Burn
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NPR. Forest Service Cuts
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PEER. Forest Service Sheds Research Capacity in Move to Utah
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Senator Martin Heinrich. Heinrich Blasts US Forest Service Chief for Trump Budget That Guts Funding for Wildfire Response and Public Safety
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Federal News Network. Forest Service Plans to Carry Out Major Reorganization With or Without Approval From Congress
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Aspen Times. U.S. Forest Service Reorganization Concerns Employee Loss, Fire Season Ahead
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Government Executive. USDA Moving Forward Various Reorgs Despite Legal Questions and Bipartisan Concerns
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Federal News Network. Forest Service Offers Separation Incentives to Employees Ahead of Upcoming Relocations
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High Country News. Forest Service Overhaul Sows Confusion, Concern
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Source New Mexico. The Forest Service Claims It’s Fully Staffed for a Worsening Fire Season. Data Shows Otherwise
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Senator John Hickenlooper. Hickenlooper, Bennet, Hurd, Neguse, DeGette, Crow, Pettersen Urge Trump Admin to Reinstate Fired Forest Service Red Card Holders
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Grassroots Wildland Firefighters. Memo on Declines in Wildfire Preparedness
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RMPBS. U.S. Forest Service Reorganization Concerns Employee Loss, Fire Season Ahead
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Federal News Network. Interior Dept. Blazes Ahead on Unified Wildland Firefighting Agency Without Congress Endorsing Plans
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NFFE. NFFE Demands Congressional Action to Stop Dismantling of U.S. Forest Service
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Senator Angus King. King, Colleagues Raise Concerns About US Forest Service Reorganization, Cuts to Services
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USDA. USDA Reorganization Comments Analysis
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IAM. NFFE-IAM Condemns USDA’s Forest Service Restructuring Plan
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Senator Martin Heinrich. Heinrich Presses USDA Secretary Rollins on US Forest Service Reorganization