UTAH

Forest Service bound for Salt Lake City

SALT LAKE CITY — President Donald Trump’s administration will move the U.S. Forest Service headquarters out of the nation’s capital to Salt Lake City as part of an organizational overhaul that involves shuttering research facilities in 31 states and concentrating resources in the West, the agency announced March 31.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said the move, which is expected to be completed by summer 2027, will bring leaders closer to the landscapes they manage and the people who depend on them.

Nearly 90% of National Forest System land is in the West, though Utah ranks 11th in national forest coverage, with about 14,300 square miles.

During his first term, Trump moved the Bureau of Land Management to Colorado, citing many of the same reasons, including a desire to put top officials closer to the public lands they oversee. But it wasn’t long before the Biden administration reversed course, moving BLM headquarters back to Washington, D.C., after two years.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has been moving thousands of employees out of Washington over the past year and eliminating layers of management as part of Trump’s push to slim down the federal workforce and make it more efficient.

With the move to Utah, about 260 Forest Service positions currently located in Washington are expected to relocate, and 130 workers will stay put, the agency said.

Deputy Agriculture Secretary Stephen Vaden said Salt Lake City stuck out for its reasonable cost of living, proximity to an international airport and the state’s “family-focused way of life.” It’s a Democratic-led capital city in a red state with values rooted in the locally headquartered Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, known widely as the Mormon church.

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, celebrated the move as “a big win for Utah and the West,” while environmental groups viewed it as a precursor to the agency’s dismantling.

Taylor McKinnon at the Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity described the move as “a costly bureaucratic reshuffle” that will put more power in the hands of corporations and states to log, mine and drill public lands.

MONTANA

State OKs Capitol rallies 

The Montana Department of Administration has reversed its guidelines that prohibited permits for weekend rallies at the state Capitol.

Following public pushback, the department on March 20 revised its guidelines that previously restricted event organizers from setting up equipment and using state resources for weekend gatherings, according to the General Services Division website.

The change comes after DOA director Misty Ann Giles told a legislative budget committee that she would revisit the permit rule after initially stating that the change to prohibit weekend events was “no big deal.”

A DOA spokesperson previously told Montana Free Press that the change to close on weekends was intended to save money. Giles told the committee that she only has five staff members who work events and that working weekends puts additional strain on state resources.

Area organizers for the “No Kings” rally first brought up the weekend ban, calling it an infringement on their right to free speech and assembly, since the nationwide protests are held on Saturdays.

The “No Kings” rally in Helena was scheduled for Saturday, March 28.

Before the reversal, nearly all of the state’s Democratic caucus signed a letter to Gov. Greg Gianforte, asking that the state reconsider the permit policy, saying it would prevent Montanans from expressing their opinions.

ARIZONA

Charlie Kirk highway vetoed

There will be no Charlie Kirk highway in his home state of Arizona. The reason: politics.

Exactly whose politics is to blame has become a point of debate.

Kirk, the conservative activist known for his campus debates, was assassinated last year during an event at Utah Valley University. Republicans in Arizona, where Kirk’s Turning Point USA organization is based, passed legislation attempting to add Kirk’s name to Loop 202, a highway circling through the sprawling Phoenix area.

Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs vetoed it on March 27.

In a veto message to state lawmakers, Hobbs denounced political violence but suggested that Republicans had inappropriately injected politics into a decision rightly left to a state board that names historic highways.

Republican state Senate President Warren Petersen, who sponsored the legislation, said it was Hobbs who practiced politics by breaking with “a long-standing Arizona tradition” of recognizing people who made an impact on society.

Lawmakers in more than 20 states have introduced over five dozen bills seeking to honor Kirk, according to an Associated Press analysis using the bill-tracking software Plural. Many propose naming things after Kirk or creating an official day of remembrance. Others invoke Kirk’s name for measures that would protect free speech rights on college campuses or encourage schools to teach about the role of Judeo-Christian values in American history.

Frat leader charged with hazing

FLAGSTAFF — The pledge master for a fraternity at Northern Arizona University was indicted on March 27 on a felony hazing charge involving a student who died in late January after a night of drinking at a rush event.

The hazing charge alleges Carter Eslick caused or forced the drinking that led to the death of 18-year-old Colin Daniel Martinez on Jan. 31 at an off-campus house.

Martinez was found unresponsive at home by police after bystanders performed CPR on him. He died at the scene.

An autopsy found Martinez died of alcohol poisoning and had a level of 0.425% — more than five times the state’s legal limit for drivers 21 and over. The state has a zero-tolerance policy for anyone under 21 who is driving under the influence of alcohol.

Josh Blumenrich, an attorney representing Eslick, didn’t immediately return a phone call seeking comment.

In a statement, the university said the death has “shaken our entire community” and noted that Eslick is no longer enrolled there.

Two other members of the Delta Tau Delta fraternity were arrested along with Eslick after Martinez’s death, but the charge filed on March 27 was only against Eslick.

Prosecutors declined to say whether they would ask a grand jury to charge the other two fraternity members.

After Martinez died, the university suspended the fraternity. The national organization later voted to shutter the NAU chapter.