Rep. Neguse and Colleagues Demand Update on Working Conditions for Federal Wildland Firefighters

Washington, D.C. — As the Trump administration continues to cut funding for the United States Forest Service (USFS), public reporting has surfaced underscoring the dire working conditions for wildland firefighters employed by the agency. In response, Colorado Congressman Joe Neguse, Ranking Member of the House Federal Lands Subcommittee, led more than a dozen of his colleagues in a letter to U.S. Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz expressing extreme concern and demanding urgent answers on plans to remedy the current state of affairs. 

Since assuming office, Donald Trump has cut the Forest Service’s workforce by 10%; an agency where roughly 75% of the staff are trained in wildland firefighting. These terminations, coupled with an increased number of firefighters getting sick from smoke exposure while fighting wildfires, are straining the agency’s workforce and weakening the nation’s federal disaster response and emergency operations. 

“We are writing to express extreme concern about recent reports of inadequate working conditions for wildland firefighters employed by the United States Forest Service (USFS) and understaffing across the agency. Given the increasing severity and frequency of wildfires across the country, especially in the Western United States, it is critical to ensure that our federal firefighting workforce is sufficiently staffed, trained, fed, and ready to respond to wildfire emergencies,” wrote Congressman Neguse and colleagues.

The questions Neguse and colleagues requested a response to include: 

“This has been a brutal fire season. Prolonged drought is fueling fierce wildfires that endanger the health and safety of federal wildland firefighters,” said Randy Erwin, National President, National Federation of Federal Employees (NFFE-IAM). “Making matters worse, the Trump Administration chose to eliminate seasoned firefighters through DOGE and other misguided schemes—compounding long-standing recruitment and retention challenges tied to low pay and poor working conditions. Unsurprisingly, the Forest Service and USDA have remained tight-lipped about the crisis and any plan to address it.”

It was co-signed by Representatives Huffman, Brownley, Carbajal, Costa, Dexter, Dingell, Elfreth, Gray, Harder, Hoyle, Lee, Leger Fernández, Min, S. Peters, Salinas, Schrier, M.D., and Whitesides. 

Dear Chief Schultz,

We are writing to express extreme concern about recent reports of inadequate working conditions for wildland firefighters employed by the United States Forest Service (USFS) and understaffing across the agency. Given the increasing severity and frequency of wildfires across the country, especially in the Western United States, it is critical to ensure that our federal firefighting workforce is sufficiently staffed, trained, fed, and ready to respond to wildfire emergencies.

Recent reporting has indicated unsafe working conditions for federal wildland firefighters as they face the toxicity of wildfire smoke without adequate protective equipment–exposing these brave men and women to extreme health risks. The toxic wildfire smoke that wildland firefighters are exposed to has been linked to countless dangerous health conditions, including cancers, and yet your agency has not provided protective equipment to firefighters, even on a voluntary basis. The USFS’ own research has outlined the dangers of wildfire smoke and called for additional protective equipment, but the agency has not done so.

These firefighters have also been asked to take on additional responsibilities outside the usual scope of their duties in response to diminished staff capacity at USFS. Firefighters have reportedly been asked to cover ranger station positions, mow lawns, and clean toilets. Many employees who support wildland fire operations have been subject to layoffs and subsequent re-hiring which places additional strain on remaining employees, including firefighters. 

Additional reports outline how firefighters battling active wildfires in the Pacific Northwest also “went hungry for several days, ran short of medical supplies, and had to scrounge for chainsaw fuel” because of staff vacancies in key positions who support the frontline firefighters. This is completely unacceptable and shameful. The brave men and women who are putting their lives on the line to battle wildfires deserve much more, and at the very least, they should be able to count on the USFS to provide reliable food and supplies.

Many of the employees who have left the USFS since the start of the year have also held Incident Qualification Cards, or red cards, which are issued to individuals who successfully complete the required training, experience, and physical fitness test by firefighting agencies. These individuals provide invaluable support during fire emergencies and are often called in by agency leadership to fill gaps in personnel during emergency scenarios, despite their regular, full-time jobs outside of incident response within the agency. You have acknowledged the importance of these red-card holding employees, requesting that any employees who left the agency this year but hold a red card come back to work for the summer months. 

In addition, despite statements from the USFS and U.S. Department of Agriculture that your agencies have hired 96-99% of your firefighters for the season, reports also indicate that there are 4,500 vacant firefighting positions at USFS, or 27% of the workforce. The American public and fire managers deserve to know the truth about the number of employees who are employed at the agency, and the extent that the workforce is understaffed. 

In response to these concerning reports about the working conditions and staffing of your agency, we request urgent answers to the following questions: 

Thank you for your ongoing attention to our national wildfire preparedness and response capacity. We look forward to your response.