How federal funding decisions are impacting the fight against wildfires in Minnesota
Firefighting resources from across the country have arrived in Minnesota to help the effort to contain the wildfires.
According to officials, at least 10 "Hot Shot" crews and dozens of engines and modules have been deployed from more than a dozen states as far as New Mexico and New Hampshire.
"Federal wildland firefighters, their specialty and their skillset is for wildfires," Steven Gutierrez, a former firefighter and current representative for the National Federation of Federal Employees, said. "They don't fight fire with water. They do it with hand tools. They do backfiring techniques. They can manage the incident as it's growing."
The specialized equipment, including planes and helicopters, can greatly inflate the cost of the these deployments, and since they are federal resources, they've been subject to review by the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency.
According to Gutierrez, roughly 2,000 probationary employees at the U.S. Forest Service were previously let go, but have since been rehired. He remains worried about cuts to administrative support staff.
"You can have the biggest army you want, but they have to be logistically supported, and all of the jobs that logistically support or plan or do part of the planning or finance to support these people on the front lines are being gutted left and right," Gutierrez warned. "You're not seeing it quite yet, but once the whole nation gets into this preparedness level, a higher preparedness level than it is right now, you're gonna see the impact on all these agencies."
Federal firefighting resources are part of several federal agencies, which are split among the Department of Agriculture (U.S. Forest Service) and the Department of the Interior (Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, Fish and Wildlife Service and Bureau of Indian Affairs).
A WCCO analysis estimates the combined budget for the agencies managing firefighter resources is $19 billion, which is roughly 1.1% of the federal budget.
