"I will put this on the footing of the environmental radicals that have prevented us from managing forests for years, and you know what, it concerns them," Zinke said in an interview with Breitbart News on Sunday.
At one point, Zinke said it was "no time to point fingers" just before pointing to "radical environmentalists".
"This is where America is – it's not time for us to point the finger, we know the problem: we've been neglected for years, and in many cases it's these environmentalists. radicals who want nature to follow its course, "said Zinke. "We have dead wood and dying, we can manage it using best scientific practices and best practices, but letting this disaster go on year after year is unacceptable."
The Interior Secretary and former Montana congressman made similar comments last week about forest fires, which killed dozens of people. A notable potential factor in the devastation that he has not mentioned is climate change.
Zinke's comments come after President Donald Trump examined Saturday's devastation in northern California and suggested picking up the forest floor to prevent future fires, saying the president of Finland had suggested the method. Finnish President Sauli Niinistö said that he did not remember discussing this tactic with Trump.
After informing the president of the state of the fires, Zinke said that Trump was "engaged".
"We have to actively manage our forests, and the president is absolutely right," said Zinke. "It's just as much of the mismanagement over time – it's not just the last administration, it's been going on for years."
Chad Hanson, John Muir Project Ecology Researcher and Sierra Club National Director, objected to the Trump administration's reasoning about the devastation.
"It is deeply troubling that Trump and his administration support logging as a way to fight fires when studies have shown that this was ineffective," Hanson wrote in an editorial about CNN this weekend. "In the most comprehensive scientific analysis conducted on the issue of forest management and fire intensity – which focused on more than 1,500 fires on tens of millions of acres in the United States. Western United States for three decades – we have discovered that forests with the least environmental problems the protections and most cuts of wood tend to burn much more intensely, not less. "
