Refuge from Cruel Trapping Act Reintroduced to Protect Wildlife and Pets on Public Lands

Washington, DC—The Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) endorses the Refuge from Cruel Trapping Act, reintroduced today in the US House of Representatives by Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY). This bill would prohibit the use of archaic body-gripping traps within the National Wildlife Refuge System (NWRS), with limited exceptions. Body-gripping traps include steel-jaw leghold traps, Conibear traps, and snares.

“Why should anyone—people, companion animals, or wildlife—have to fear stepping into a bone-crushing trap while enjoying our nation’s beautiful wildlife refuge system?” said Susan Millward, AWI’s executive director and CEO. “Public lands belong to all of us—not just the select few who wish to set traps that smash limbs or agonizingly strangle airways. Thank you to Representative Nadler for your commitment to ending the use of cruel traps in our country’s refuges.”

“When Americans visit their local National Wildlife Refuges, most expect to enjoy nature without worrying that they—or their pets—will fall victim to a dangerous trap,” Nadler said. “However, trapping is still allowed in many of the more than 570 refuges across the country, putting people, pets, and endangered species in danger of serious injury. These cruel devices have no place on protected public lands, and my bill will make sure our refuges are safe from this inhumane practice.”

The purpose of these protected lands is clear: to be a refuge where native wildlife can thrive and all Americans can enjoy our great outdoors. The NWRS contains one of the most diverse collections of fish and wildlife habitats in the world and provides a home for more than 380 endangered species. Yet nearly half of these refuges allow trapping. Body-gripping traps are inhumane and inherently nonselective, meaning they indiscriminately injure and kill nontarget animals.

These brutal traps endanger not only wild animals but also the pets of millions of visitors who spend time in the nation’s refuges each year. There have been a number of incidents in which pets have been killed. In December 2022, for example, a three-year-old Shetland sheepdog died after her neck was caught in a Conibear trap near a wooded trail in Vermont—the state’s 13^th incident of a pet being caught in a trap that year.

To learn more about this issue, please visit https://awionline.org/content/refuge-cruel-trapping-act.