On February 16th, while we were distracted by the head-spinning chaos in the White House, Congress was quietly passing legislation to “make America great again.” One such action was HJ Res 69, overturning a Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) rule prohibiting egregious trophy-hunting methods and “predator control” including denning of wolves with pups (shooting or trapping wolves at their dens in the spring), killing hibernating bears with cubs, trapping bears with steel-jawed leghold traps and wire snares, luring grizzlies with food to get a point blank kill, and using airplanes to scout, land and shoot grizzlies on Alaska’s national wildlife refuges.
Rep. Scott Tipton helped pass the measure last Thursday with an appalling partisan vote of 225 to 193. If the Senate concurs, we’ll see a privileged few “Great White Hunters” again using cowardly and cruel methods to kill for trophies on wildlife refuges.
Backers cried “state’s rights,” but Alaska voters oppose these inhumane and unsporting methods by a 2-1 margin, and state and federal wildlife scientists have roundly condemned them. With Thursday’s vote, the House undid a rule, years in the works, launched by professional wildlife scientists at the FWS.
The practices are disallowed in almost every state, yet the House has approved reviving them in national wildlife refuges — the one category of federal lands specifically created to protect wildlife and promote the diversity of species.
I marvel at how Rep. Tipton and his fellow Republicans can sleep at night after casting such a shameful, clearly partisan vote. Perhaps, in some alternate world, they actually believe these egregious practices reflect something that makes America great. It’s certainly not a world I want to live in.
What are we to do? Since the resolution now goes before the Senate as SJ Res 18, we can contact Sen. Cory Gardner at (202) 224-5941 and let him know where we stand. In addition, we can make our voices heard, and be a voice for wildlife, by turning out in force to vote in 2018, show Tipton the door, and elect someone who actually represents us.
Kathryn Lair
Ridgway
