When I first interviewed former Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke for Townhall earlier this year, he was simply a candidate for his old Congress gig. Though he was the presumed frontrunner for Montana’s newly-drawn 1st Congressional District, he faced some challenges from fellow Republicans.
Although he narrowly won the June primary, today he is favored to beat his Democrat challenger, Monica Tranel—a former Republican who’ll be a rubber-stamp vote for the Biden administration.
Despite having a slew of ethics charges leveled at him, Zinke was ultimately cleared of any wrongdoing.
As of this writing, the former Navy SEAL has a 94 in 100 chance of winning MT-1 per FiveThirtyEight in a seat that consistently rates “Likely Republican.” For context, former President Trump won the district 53.5% to Biden’s 46.5% in 2020.
During a recent reporting trip to Montana, I caught up with Mr. Zinke in his hometown Whitefish, Montana—a town due north of Kalispell.
It wouldn’t, however, be a proper interview with the former Cabinet member without wildlife in the mix. A yearly black bear made a surprise appearance at our meeting spot. Thankfully, the creature was more interested in eating apples than snacking on me or the former Interior Secretary.
After the young bear went its way, we ventured to nearby Peace Park to discuss a plethora of topics, ranging from public lands to forest management.
On the subject of forestry, Zinke was very critical of President Biden’s policies of forest mismanagement.
Last year, nearly one million forest land acres burned in the Treasure State. That’s unacceptable in his eyes.
“When hundreds of thousands of forests burn down needlessly, it's time to manage our forests,” Zinke told me.
“Managing forests is about making sure you're looking at sustainable yield. Make sure you have prescribed burns late in the season. Make sure we get rid of the dead and dying timber,” he added. “When we have a problem like beetle kills or invasive species, we need to get on it. We don't let it fester until millions and millions of acres are in jeopardy.”
Although his agency didn’t directly oversee forestry policies - the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) falls under the purview of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) - Zinke’s department frequently collaborated with USDA and USFS, through co-issuing memorandums of understanding (MOU) with former USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue—both of whom consistently stressed active forest management.
With respect to the Biden Doctrine on energy production, the Montanan wasn’t shy about criticizing the administration’s role in weakening U.S. energy security.
“When I came in as secretary, we were 8.3 million barrels a day on energy. A million barrels a day production and declining. In two short years, we were 12.5 million barrels a day and rising. The world's largest energy producer, but we also lowered emissions because it is better to produce energy in this country under our regulation than watching it produced overseas with no regulation,” Zinke explained.
“This administration is absolutely against fossil fuels. And their alternative has no answers. We want to go to EV [electric vehicles]— where does electricity come from? How are we going to dispose of the batteries? This is a big wave coming up on batteries, and they're toxic. And 90% of the solar cells, they don't get recycled. They get thrown in the landfill.”
In response to some of his former House colleagues supporting the RETURN Act, he praised the Pittman-Robertson Act.
“I've been a long advocate that if you make wealth on public land, so, too, should you have a greater obligation to maintain it. And that's a fundamental [reason] why Pittman-Robertson — with our bullets and ammunition and outdoor — help pay for conservation. And oh, by the way: so does oil and gas.”
He continued, “The fundamentals of the Great American Outdoors Act— which I put together— [is] the greatest investment in the history of this country to repair our national forests and park infrastructure. What drives it is the fundamental idea that …everything that generates power, energy, wealth from our public lands, those companies have a greater obligation to make sure they reclaim it. And look, I'm a boy scout, right? You always leave your campground in as good or better condition than you find it. That's the rule.”
Zinke, if sent to Washington again, desires to bring “the Montana spirit” with him to D.C.
“The Montana spirit: we're pretty libertarian out here. Not liberal— Libertarian and that we just don't like to be told what to do,” he proclaimed. “And we really don't like to be told [what] to do from a D.C. that doesn't understand.”
“It's always better to push decisions to state and local communities where people have a buy-in and they understand the water systems and how important it is. And [in] Montana— we enjoy our public lands. We think we're pretty good at managing them, but [what] we really don't like is when D.C. decides to manage for us.”