The House Natural Resources Committee has continued to pursue a markedly anti-wildlife agenda by teeing up action on an array of bills to weaken and eliminate protections under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA).
The committee spent July holding meetings on bills that would delist the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem population of grizzly bears while barring any legal challenge, prohibit key federal agencies from regulating the use of lead ammunition or fishing tackle in areas under their jurisdiction, gut the core standards of the MMPA while creating impossibly high evidentiary hurdles, subvert the ESA’s essential requirement that listing decisions be based on sound science, and delist captive sturgeon species, among other provisions that cater to industry interests at the expense of species survival. AWI will continue fighting these bills, as well as all others that take aim at our bedrock conservation statutes.