This year’s Capitol Christmas Tree rolled into Washington D.C. after a cross country
trip from Colorado. The seventy three feet tall, nine thousand pound Engleman spruce
was specially selected from the White River National Forest to adorn the front lawn of
the U.S. Capitol as Colorado’s Christmas gift to the nation. On behalf of the Forest
Service every year we get to bring a gift to the nation in the form of this Christmas
tree, and we’re proud in Colorado and for the White River National Forest to be able
to give this gift and bring the message that more than just the tree it’s the value of
our public lands and the value of our natural resources to America. You know, it’s a gift
from Colorado to the people of the United States and people just were really excited
and proud of the fact that it came from Colorado and it came from one of their national forests.
Former Colorado U.S. Senator and licensed truck driver Ben Nighthorse Campbell drove
the tree from his state to D.C. He said the tree symbolized his state’s resiliency after
this summer’s devastating wild fires. I think that was the message we wanted to send
that we had a very tough summer with forest fires, but Colorado is alive and well and
this tree is living proof of it. House speaker John Boehner will light the tree on December
fourth. In Washington D.C. for the U.S. Department of Agriculture I’m Bob Ellison.
