The Bureau of Land Management has prepared an environmental impact statement that claims to analyze the impacts of its plan to use aerial spraying of herbicides to control invasive plant species on public lands. The proposal would allow the agency to spray 18 different herbicides, many of them "new" and untested, on 261 million acres of land in the 17 western states, including Alaska.

Despite outrage voiced by thousands of citizens worried about the risks of herbicide use to humans, plants, and wildlife, the agency's plan has remained essentially unchanged. The Bureau is determined to forge ahead, providing only the hollowest of promises about the safety of the planned spraying and additional environmental review later.