We Must Save the Giant Sequoias

Floor Speech

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Mr. WESTERMAN. Madam Speaker, after visiting the Mariposa Grove of giant sequoias, Teddy Roosevelt famously declared: ``A grove of giant redwood or sequoias should be kept just as we keep a great and beautiful cathedral.''

Madam Speaker, today that cathedral is on fire. The very grove in which President Roosevelt stood is enveloped in flames as we speak, threatening to destroy these iconic trees forever.

We are seeing the horrific consequences of decades of forest mismanagement play out in Yosemite, and it is time to act to save our sequoias.

Wildfires burn so hot and so intensely that they quite literally explode giant sequoias and create ``fire-nados,'' sending branches and bark hurling so far into the air that they have narrowly missed taking out our firefighting planes. If giant sequoias can't withstand these raging infernos, no tree stands a chance.

Time is not on our side, Madam Speaker. I urge immediate action on the Save Our Sequoias Act to give land managers in California the resources they so desperately need, preventing firefighters from having to resort to desperate measures to save these national treasures. This is the only way we can conserve America's most beautiful cathedral for generations to come.

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