With wildfires fires ravaging Los Angeles, the firefighter-turned-senator from Montana wants to fight bureaucracy.
Less than a week into his new job, Montana Republican Tim Sheehy is finding plenty of use for his previous experience as an aerial firefighter and wildfire entrepreneur as he pushes for new legislation to address the new reality of a fire season that never ends.
Reset your view of wildfires
“There’s a huge dichotomy in America between structural firefighting — the red fire truck, traditional firemen everyone’s familiar with — and wildland firefighting,” Sheehy told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on Thursday, adding that the country needs more money to fight wildfires and to cut past wildlife protections when flames are raging.
“The entire wildfire community has been speaking for years, shouting from the rooftops that this big one was going to be coming, and we’re not ready,” he said. That big one is now here in Los Angeles, he said…