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Press Release: House Republicans Unveil Another Anti-wolf, Anti-endangered Species Appropriations Bill

Press Releases, 2016 News

For Immediate Release
May 24, 2016

Press Contact: Jamie Pang
(858) 699-4153
Jpang@biologicaldiversity.org

House Republicans Unveil Another Anti-wolf, Anti-endangered Species Appropriations Bill

114th Congress Has Now Launched Nearly 20 Legislative Attacks on Wolves

WASHINGTON— Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives today introduced a bill to fund the U.S. Department of the Interior that includes a poison-pill rider to end federal protections for wolves in Wyoming and the western Great Lakes and to undermine other endangered species protections. The legislative rider would undo two court decisions affirming that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wrongly removed Endangered Species Act protections for the wolf.

The bill is the 18th attack by the current Congress on gray wolves nationwide and the 12th attack targeting wolves in the Great Lakes and Wyoming populations.

“This is the most extreme, anti-wolf Congress our country has ever seen,” said Jamie Pang, an endangered species campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Rather than allowing for wolf recovery to follow a course prescribed by science, a small group of politicians has repeatedly tried to undermine species protections through unrelated policy riders tacked onto must-pass federal spending bills.”

The Fish and Wildlife Service removed protections for gray wolves in the Great Lakes region (Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota) in 2011, and in Wyoming in 2012. In both instances federal judges overturned agency decisions for prematurely removing protections, failing to follow the requirements of the Act and failing to follow the best available science. Republican lawmakers have responded by repeatedly attempting to remove protections from wolves and open the animals up to state-regulated hunting and trapping. Since the passage of the 2011 wolf rider that removed protections from wolves in the northern Rocky Mountains, there have been almost 30 legislative attacks on wolves in Congress. Already in 2016 there have been 10 legislative attacks, surpassing the number of anti-wolf bills for all of 2015.

In addition to this rider, the appropriations bill also contains language preventing the greater sage grouse from being protected under the Act, and would weaken protections for salmon and the Delta smelt in California’s Bay-Delta region.

“This shameful meddling is harmful to science, harmful to the rule of law, and harmful to our democratic processes,” said Pang. “Congressional lawmakers know that 90 percent of American voters support the Endangered Species Act, which precisely is why they have to resort to such back-door attempts at weakening the law.”

Despite overwhelming public support for the Endangered Species Act and the species it protects, there has been a greater than 600 percent increase in Republican-led legislative attacks on endangered species since the landmark ruling in Citizens United.

The Center for Biological Diversity is a national, nonprofit conservation organization with more than 1 million members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places.

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Take Action to Keep Wolves Protected – Stop Anti-Wolf Legislation

If some members of Congress have their way, wolves across some or even all of the lower 48 states will lose their Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections through stand-alone bills or riders on must-pass legislation.

Your help is needed now to stop anti-wolf, anti-Endangered Species Act legislation from moving forward.

Please contact your members of Congress and President Obama and tell them decisions about the future of endangered species should be based on science, not politics.

Bills or riders aimed at stripping endangered wolves of federal protections put more than wolves in peril – they threaten all wildlife and the Endangered Species Act itself. Wolves are being used as pawns in a larger effort to sink the ark that provides for the conservation of all animals.

Please contact members of Congress and the President today and urge them to oppose any anti-wolf legislation.

You will be most effective if you call personally or send an email in your own words. Whether you call or write, please be polite so that your message will be heard. Remember, you will most likely connect with a staffer who will pass your message along.

Sample message for phone calls or emails:

Start by identifying yourself and where you’re calling from.

I am calling to urge [the Senator, the Congressman, the President] to oppose any legislation or riders that will weaken the Endangered Species Act or reduce protections for wolves. These decisions should be made through science, not politics. Appropriations bills and other must-pass legislation should be kept clean of anti-wolf and other controversial riders. Thank you.

Phone numbers:

· Congress members’ contact information can be found at https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members.

· White House Phone: (202) 456-1111

· White House Email: https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

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Thank you for acting for wolves today!

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