Ask Congress: co-sponsor PAW & FIN Conservation Act of 2019

The Trump administration has just gutted the Endangered Species Act (ESA)—one of America’s bedrock environmental laws—to benefit the fossil fuel industry and developers at the expense of imperiled plants and animals. Please ask Congress today to protect endangered wildlife.

The ESA has been one of the most effective environmental statutes in America, with 99 percent of species listed now on the path towards recovery. Many threatened and endangered species protected by the ESA—such as the grizzly bear, grey wolf, bull trout, Canada lynx, and desert tortoise—are found within America’s National Wilderness Preservation System.

The Trump administration’s ESA rollback comes on the heels of a United Nations report which warned that one million plant and animal species are on the verge of extinction world-wide due to over-development, habitat destruction, and climate change, with alarming implications for the natural world and human survival. 

According to our friends at the Endangered Species Coalition, the "Trump Extinction Plan" weakens the Endangered Species Act in three ways:

1. It removes protections for any new species designated as "threatened." States could even open hunting and trapping seasons on threatened species unless explicitly prevented from doing so.
2. Under the ESA, listing decisions must be based on science alone. This rule upends that.  It encourages policy-makers to deny protections to wildlife and plants if industry lobbyists perceive a potential economic cost.
3. It reduces the agencies’ ability to protect habitat, despite habitat loss being the leading cause of extinction.

These changes are clearly designed to ram through pipeline, road, logging, drilling, and fracking projects at the expense of threatened and endangered wildlife!

Over our 30-year history, Wilderness Watch has relied on the ESA to help protect threatened and endangered species that use Wilderness for part or all of their range. One current example is our lawsuit to stop the killing of grizzly bears at bait stations used by some hunters to lure black bears on national forest lands in Idaho and Wyoming, an unethical practice that is unbelievably still allowed within designated Wilderness in Idaho.

Please take action to defend and strengthen the Endangered Species Act by urging your members of Congress to co-sponsor and support the PAW and FIN Conservation Act of 2019 (H.R. 4348 and S. 2491).

- Wilderness Watch 

Stop Congressional Attacks On Gray Wolves

Congress’ attacks on the Endangered Species Act and the struggling wildlife it protects continue to mount. Gray wolves desperately need your help!

WHY THIS MATTERS

The future of gray wolf recovery is in jeopardy, as Congress continues their attacks on the vulnerable wolves.

Last month, the House of Representatives passed HR 6874, a horrible anti-wolf bill that would severely undermine the Endangered Species Act, and your ability to defend wildlife in court.

The misleadingly named “Manage Our Wolves” Act strips Endangered Species protections from all gray wolves in the lower 48, handing their management over to hostile state wildlife agencies. It even limits your ability to hold wildlife agencies accountable in court, setting a dangerous precedent.

Now House Republicans are trying to add the text of the “Manage Our Wolves” act as a rider into the House’s must-pass spending bill. If they succeed, these attacks will become law, and gray wolf recovery would be devastated.

Members of Congress in both chambers can pressure their leadership to get this toxic anti-wildlife, anti-accountability rider removed. But we must demand it.

CLICK HERE to sign the following Sierra Club petition:

(Add a personal comment for even more impact.) 

I am deeply concerned by the current effort in Congress to push anti-wildlife legislation into law as "riders" on the FY 2019 Interior and Environment Minibus III spending bill currently being considered in the House. 

If Minibus III passes as-is, the riders would officially strip Endangered Species protections from gray wolves in Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin, double down on the delisting of Wyoming gray wolves, call for Interior to delist all gray wolves in the lower 48 and limit the public’s ability to seek judicial relief. 

Wolves have just begun to recover in some areas of the country. Since the effort to restore wolf populations began in 1980's, we have had some great successes, and we now have wolves in the northern Rocky Mountains and the Midwest. But it is too soon to remove wolves from the federal endangered species list, as several courts have confirmed. Continued federal protections are critical to securing the fragile recovery of existing wolf populations and allowing wolves to expand into other suitable habitats.

Any legislation that interferes with existing federal wolf protections would be harmful to wolf recovery in the United States. It would also undermine the Endangered Species Act (ESA), one of our most effective and important environmental laws. 

Ideological anti-environmental policy "riders" don’t belong in government spending bills. This set of irrelevant, unnecessary amendments would fast-track a series of horrible attacks on wildlife and undermine the power of the Endangered Species Act, one of the most effective pieces of legislation in our history. 

I urge you to push Congressional leadership to remove anti-wildlife riders from this spending bill, and uphold federal protections for wolves.

https://www.addup.org/campaigns/take-action-to-protect-wolves?promoid=7010Z0000027L0UQAU

- SierraRise 

TAKE ACTION: Stop the attack on endangered wildlife

The grizzly bear, the gray whale, and the bald eagle all faced extinction until the Endangered Species Act saved them. Now that same law is facing its own extinction, thanks to the Trump administration.

Speak up now to stop the Trump administration’s rollback of the Endangered Species Act.

Putting the interests of extractive industries over imperiled wildlife, Trump-appointed Interior Secretary Zinke has proposed a disastrous set of regulatory changes—best characterized as an “Extinction Plan”—that would severely undermine the Act and make it easier for destructive corporations such as oil and gas and mining companies to push through their projects.

For nearly 45 years the Endangered Species Act has been a vital last line of defense for plants and animals on the verge of extinction. And just as our planet is experiencing what scientists call a sixth mass extinction period, the Trump-Zinke Extinction Plan would take us in exactly the wrong direction.

For the sake of our planet and all the generations still to come, we must stop the Trump-Zinke Extinction Plan in its tracks. Take action today to protect the Endangered Species Act and the animals and plants under its care.

Take action now and stop the attack on endangered wildlife.

- Earth Justice

Tell the National Marine Fisheries Service to protect the Endangered Species Act

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) recently proposed a series of regulatory changes that would undermine the U.S. Endangered Species Act and jeopardize critical protections for wildlife.

The Endangered Species Act has proven to be an incredibly successful tool for protecting imperiled wildlife—nearly every species listed since the law was enacted has been saved from extinction. Yet the current administration is seeking to weaken the law by relaxing the regulations that guide its implementation.

Among the proposed regulatory changes are efforts to: weaken protections for threatened species; open the door to substituting economic considerations for sound science; interfere with the establishment and protection of critical habitat; and undermine the role of inter-agency consultation in safeguarding species.

It's critical that you let FWS/NMFS know that you value this essential law and oppose their proposals to weaken it.

- Beth Allgood, IFAW US Country Director

Click here to send the following message:   

(Feel free to personalize it for even more impact.)

Send to: National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS):

I am writing to express my strong opposition to regulatory changes proposed in the following U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) rulemaking dockets, which were published on July 25, 2018: FWS-HQ-ES-2018-0006; FWS-HQ-ES-2018-0007; and FWS-HQ-ES-2018-0009.

The U.S. Endangered Species Act has proven to be an incredibly successful tool for protecting imperiled wildlife—nearly every species listed since the law was enacted has been saved from extinction. The pending proposals to weaken the law by relaxing the very regulations that guide its implementation would threaten its continued success, and run counter to the spirit of the Endangered Species Act and the Services’ missions.

More Information:

THE ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT: A WILD SUCCESS

These creatures faced extinction. The Endangered Species Act saved them.

Trump Administration Proposes Revamping the Endangered Species Act

Stop the Trump administration’s rollback of the Endangered Species Act

The grizzly bear, the gray whale, and the bald eagle all faced extinction until the Endangered Species Act saved them. Now that same law is facing its own extinction, thanks to the Trump administration.

Speak up now to stop the Trump administration’s rollback of the Endangered Species Act.

Putting the interests of extractive industries over imperiled wildlife, Trump-appointed Interior Secretary Zinke has proposed a disastrous set of regulatory changes—best characterized as an “Extinction Plan”—that would severely undermine the Act and make it easier for destructive corporations such as oil and gas and mining companies to push through their projects.

For nearly 45 years the Endangered Species Act has been a vital last line of defense for plants and animals on the verge of extinction. And just as our planet is experiencing what scientists call a sixth mass extinction period, the Trump-Zinke Extinction Plan would take us in exactly the wrong direction.

For the sake of our planet and all the generations still to come, we must stop the Trump-Zinke Extinction Plan in its tracks. Take action today to protect the Endangered Species Act and the animals and plants under its care.

Take action now and stop the attack on endangered wildlife.

-Marjorie Mulhall, Legislative Director of Lands, Wildlife, Oceans

Trump Takes a Stand Against…Endangered Species? | The Daily Show

The Trump administration wants to roll back endangered species protections

Endangered Species Act stripped of key provisions in Trump administration proposal

Tell Secretary Zinke: Honor Tribal sovereignty, stop the trophy hunts!

The decision to remove Endangered Species protections from Greater Yellowstone grizzlies was clearly a bad one -- based on bad science, and shortsightedness about the continued challenges the bears face.

Hundreds of thousands of emails and phone calls from scientists, wildlife photographers, conservationists and wildlife lovers have been ignored. Wyoming, Montana and Idaho, three states notoriously hostile to carnivores, now control their future -- Wyoming and Idaho have trophy hunts scheduled to start on September 1.

And perhaps worst of all, the Department of Interior has never honored Tribal Nations’ call for consultation on management of the Greater Yellowstone grizzly -- a process required by federal law.

Sec. Zinke is certainly aware of this responsibility. He even committed, in Congressional testimony, to consult with Tribes before the delisting, citing a moral and legal responsibility to do so -- only to delist the bears literally hours later.

Demand respect for Tribal sovereignty and wildlife! Tell Zinke: Reinstate grizzly protections, stop the trophy hunt and consult with Tribes now!

- Sierra Club 

Submit a comment: Trump administration save the Endangered Species Act

Extinction is forever. If we lose the polar bear... the manatee... the orca whale... the sage grouse... the bearded seal... we will never get them back.

Yet the Trump administration just announced alarming plans to dramatically weaken the Endangered Species Act — a landmark law with an astonishing 99% success rate that has been a literal lifesaver for hundreds of species on the brink of extinction.

Trump's plan is a devastating blow for threatened wildlife. They don't have a voice to fight back — but we do. Right now, the Interior and Commerce Departments are accepting comments from the public on this disastrous plan.

We need your help to mobilize a massive public outcry that will let President Trump, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, and Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke know we're watching them — and we will not stop fighting to protect threatened and endangered species.

TAKE ACTION: Submit an official comment calling on the Trump administration to reverse course and save the Endangered Species Act.

Make no mistake: This is the biggest attack on the Endangered Species Act in decades. The very agencies that are charged with saving imperiled species are trying to gut the law's bedrock protections. The proposed rollbacks would:

• Make it more difficult to extend protections to threatened species, delaying lifesaving action until a species' population is so small it may be challenging or impossible to save
• Exempt climate change from key parts of the law, making it more difficult to protect the polar bear, the bearded seal, and many other imperiled species that are impacted by the effects of climate change
• Require economic factors to be analyzed when deciding if a species should be saved
• Make it easier for companies to build roads, pipelines, mines, and other industrial projects in critical habitat areas that are essential to imperiled species' survival

The Trump administration is giving its friends in the drilling, mining, and logging industries the green light to destroy fragile wildlife habitats and drive our most threatened species to the brink of extinction, just to bolster corporate polluter profits.

Tell them you won't stand for it. Submit a comment calling on Secretary Zinke, Secretary Ross, and President Trump to halt their attacks on the Endangered Species Act.

The bald eagle, the humpback whale, and the grizzly bear are just a few of the hundreds of iconic species saved by the ESA. It's no wonder that an overwhelming majority of Americans support the law and want their elected officials to protect it.

At NRDC, we've led the fight to add imperiled animals and plants to the Endangered Species List, and we've successfully defended vulnerable wildlife like humpback whales and rusty patched bumble bees in court.

Now, we're fighting tirelessly to protect the Endangered Species Act itself from the Trump administration's attacks. And if necessary, we'll take Trump and his allies to court to save the ESA.

Please join our fight today by calling on the Trump administration to save the ESA — and the countless species whose lives depend on it — while we still can.

- Rhea Suh, President, NRDC

Tell Congress: Don’t Weaken the Endangered Species Act

Bills that could seriously weaken the Endangered Species Act are making their way through both the House of Representatives and the Senate. The proposed plans would make it harder for species to get protection under the Act and make it easier to strip species of their protected status. These changes would strip protections from the gray wolf, the sage grouse and the American burying beetle.

Another proposal, a rule change from the Department of the Interior, would allow economic interests, like those of the fossil fuel industry, to be taken into consideration when deciding if a species should be granted protections.

If successful, these rollbacks would not only drive American plants and animals towards extinction, they would also open up vast areas of land to extracting fossil fuels. The coal, oil and gas industries are lobbying for these changes, but if we want to fight climate change, we need to keep those fuels in the ground.

This week, we can act on climate by contacting our elected officials and asking them to oppose efforts to weaken the Endangered Species Act. When you call, you can say something like this:

“Hello, I’m calling to urge [YOUR OFFICIAL’s NAME] to oppose efforts to weaken the Endangered Species Act, including rules that would allow corporate interests to be considered when deciding if a species should receive protections. Thank you.”

- The Years Project 

CONTACT YOUR OFFICIAL

Rep. Martha McSally's website

Sen. John McCain's website

Sen. Jeff Flake's website

More information

Push to Weaken U.S. Endangered Species Act Runs into Roadblocks

Scientists Tell Congress: Don’t Strip Science Out of the Endangered Species Act

Tell Congress: Protect the Endangered Species Act from Republican attacks

click to enlarge 

The petition to Congress reads: "Forcefully reject and work to block any proposal that would gut the Endangered Species Act." Add your name:

It's absolutely alarming: The Endangered Species Act itself is now as threatened as the wildlife that it's meant to protect. Republican Sen. John Barrasso, longtime friend of the fossil fuel industry and enemy of the ESA, recently proposed new legislation to severely weaken the decades-old law that has saved dozens of endangered species and helped the recovery of hundreds more.1 What's more, the Trump administration just announced its own plans to roll back protections in the ESA to make it easier to de-list species.2 The future of countless threatened species is at stake if we don't take action now. We must speak out to build massive public pressure on Congress to reject this legislation and stop any attempt to weaken the ESA. Tell Congress: Protect the Endangered Species Act from Republican attacks. Click here to sign the petition. Since it was enacted in the 1970s, the ESA has been wildly successful in protecting endangered species on the brink of extinction.3 More than 99 percent of all species listed on the ESA have been saved, including the iconic bald eagle, grey wolf, whooping crane, and grizzly bear. Yet, under Sen. Barrasso's purely political, unscientific proposal, these incredible gains to protect imperiled animal and plant species could be completely wiped out. His legislation would shift much of the broad protection authorities away from the federal government and onto the states, that lack the resources to protect endangered species.4 It's no surprise that Sen. Barrasso has been leading the charge to gut the ESA: He is one of the fossil fuel and mining industries' top recipients of campaign cash. From 2011 to 2016, Barrasso received more than $700,000 from extractive industries that are eager to exploit the land that endangered species inhabit.5 And, as a result, Barrasso has been more than willing to do the industry's bidding. He has a long legislative record attacking the ESA, having led the charge on 10 bills to gut the ESA and voting against the law nearly a dozen times.6 Tell Congress: Protect the Endangered Species Act from Republican attacks. Click here to sign the petition. This is a fight we can win. While Barrasso and the fossil fuel industry continue to wage a lobbying and public relations campaign to weaken the law, the public is not falling for their spin. Polls show that the ESA is wildly popular – 90 percent of voters support the law and 70 percent believe scientists, not politicians, should decide which species should be listed under the act.7 At a time when climate change is threatening endangered species at an ever-growing rate, our public officials should be working to enact stronger protections, not weaker ones that allow the fossil fuel industry to exacerbate the climate crisis. Please add your name today demanding that Congress reject this dangerous Republican attack on our nation's endangered species. Tell Congress: Protect the Endangered Species Act from Republican attacks. Click the link below to sign the petition: https://act.credoaction.com/sign/protect_esa?t=8&akid=29346%2E3130208%2E7npXj4 - Josh Nelson, CREDO Action Add your name: References: Mark Hand, "Republican senator wants to undermine the law that saved the bald eagle," ThinkProgress, July 2, 2018. Miranda Green and Timothy Cama, "Trump administration introduces proposal to roll back Endangered Species Act protections," The Hill, July 19, 2018. Center for Biological Diversity, "A Wild Success: A Systematic Review of Bird Recovery Under the Endangered Species Act," June 2016. Hand, "Republican senator wants to undermine the law that saved the bald eagle." Rebecca Bowe, "What’s Behind Attacks on the Endangered Species Act? Lots of Industry Money," July 18, 2017. Center for Biological Diversity, "Senator Barrasso Proposes Legislation to Gut Endangered Species Act," July 2, 2018. Tulchin Research, "Poll Finds Overwhelming, Broad-Based Support for the Endangered Species Act Among Voters Nationwide," July 6, 2015.

TAKE ACTION! Demand a Farm Bill that protects our food, environment, and workers

Every five years since the 1930s, Congress grants funding for our nation’s food security, nutrition and conservation programs in a package called the Farm Bill. But every time, big agriculture lobbys to taint the bill with language that degrades our land, exposes our farmworkers to toxic chemicals and strips protections for endangered species.

This year, with Big Ag. pulling nearly every lever of power in Washington, the attacks on these crucial farm, food and conservation programs are more blatant and reckless than ever before.

But your congressperson’s job is to represent you, not Big Ag. Tell them that any Farm Bill passed needs to protect our food, farmworkers and environment.

This year’s particularly pernicious bill lets Big Ag poison our water supplies and species on the brink of extinction, and ignore health and safety of the farmers and farmworkers who grow our food. Pesticides threaten our waterways, pollinators, salmon, whooping cranes, California condors and other species. New pesticides could go to market without any safeguards for the farmworkers exposed to them. They could be applied directly into our water supplies without meaningful oversight. And if your state wants to protect you from pesticide exposure, it would be prevented from doing so.

The alarming pesticide provisions alone should make this bill dead-on-arrival, but it attacks our National Forests and strips conservation programs of nearly $1 billion, too.

These programs are essential for soil health, water quality and wildlife habitat on farm land. National forest stakeholders will lose out to the logging industry through waivers of the National Environmental Policy Act, Endangered Species Act, and Roadless Rule.

Finally, our own democracy takes a hit by restricting our right to enforce agricultural law through the courts while expanding judicial access for industry.

Tell your representative that you demand a Farm Bill that protects our food, environment, and workers.

Quick signature needed: Endangered species need you

Your representative needs to hear from you before they vote! Right now, anti-environment interests in Congress are attempting to gut the Endangered Species Act, despite bipartisan and overwhelming public support for this critical line of defense for at-risk marine life.

Tell your representative in Congress: Protect the Endangered Species Act from anti-environment attacks before the world’s most at-risk ocean animals disappear once and for all >>

Endangered species like Hawaiian monk seals depend on you for their survival. Hawaiian monk seals are one of the most endangered marine mammals on Earth, suffering from a lack of food, entanglement in fishing gear and habitat loss. As of 2007, fewer than 1,300 Hawaiian monk seals remained. But, thanks to laws like the Endangered Species Act (ESA), we have seen their population levels begin to increase.

Now, it’s the seal-saving ESA itself that is endangered in Congress.

Any day now, Congress will vote on a series of anti-environment bills designed to undermine and chip away at the ESA. These grave attacks could be disastrous for Hawaiian monk seals and other endangered species dependent on ESA protections. That’s why these ocean animals desperately need you to speak up today.

The ESA is one of the nation’s most successful and popular laws. 99 percent of all species listed as endangered or threatened under the ESA have avoided extinction.

By saving ocean animals from extinction, the ESA also supports healthy ecosystems and natural places, and provides significant economic benefits within the United States from wildlife tourism. Sea turtle ecotourism in Juno Beach, Florida alone has an annual economic impact of around $60 million.

Why would Congress now undermine this success story and abandon endangered species?

Special interests in Congress want to further their anti-environment agendas, and they’ll win if we don’t take a strong stand for oceans and endangered species today. Please, speak up on behalf of Hawaiian monk seals, and our oceans and communities, before it’s too late.

Save endangered species and the law that protects them: Tell your member of Congress to oppose any legislation that would weaken the Endangered Species Act >>

The ESA is a success story – one that we cannot afford to let Congress rewrite.

- Alex Gray, Oceana

CALL NOW: Congress advances a war on wolves

Congress is back at it with another damaging attack on Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves.

A new Senate Sportsmen’s bill, S. 1514, contains a damaging provision targeting gray wolves. This “War on Wolves” legislation would block federal protections for wolves in four states and allow them to be trophy hunted, trapped and otherwise killed.

Call your U.S. senators now and tell them that you OPPOSE S. 1514 and all other attacks on protections for gray wolves.

If this “War On Wolves” legislation passes out of Congress and is signed by President Trump, it would hand the fate of wolves in Minnesota, Michigan, and Wisconsin over to states whose wolf management plans were ruled illegal under the Endangered Species Act. This damaging legislation would also strip citizens of the right to challenge these lethal Midwest programs in court. It would also block citizens’ rights to challenge the management of wolves in Wyoming, where wolves are currently subject to a hostile state management program that allows for unlimited shoot-on-sight killing of wolves across 85 percent of the state.

Wolves have just begun to recover in some areas of the continental United States after being nearly wiped out by centuries of ruthless hunting, trapping and poisoning. Despite fragile successes that have brought wolves back to the northern Rockies and the Midwest, they are still missing from a vast majority of their former range and are subject to mounting persecution even where they have been restored.

If anti-wolf members of Congress get their way, the result will be more dead wolves and a blow to the Endangered Species Act, our nation’s safety net for imperiled species.

We must stand up for wolves and the law that helped bring them back from the brink of extinction—the Endangered Species Act.

Please call your U.S. senators now and ask them to oppose S. 1514 and all other attacks on protections for gray wolves.

- Marjorie Mulhall, Lands,Wildlife,Oceans

Today is Endangered Species Day! Please, defend the Endangered Species Act from President Trump's dangerous anti-environment agenda.

Today is Endangered Species Day. I hope you'll join NRDC in celebrating the progress we've made in protecting endangered species — and stay vigilant about defending our critical laws like the Endangered Species Act from President Trump's dangerous anti-environment agenda.

The Endangered Species Act has prevented 99% of the species it has covered from going extinct. It has helped revive iconic species like the bald eagle, the American alligator and the California condor. Now, anti-wildlife members of Congress have introduced legislative attacks that would gut the Act, jeopardizing the existence of plants and animals across the U.S.

We can't let this fundamental environmental law be decimated by the President and anti-wildlife lawmakers.

Here are 6 simple things you can do right now on Endangered Species Day to help preserve the Endangered Species Act and save imperiled wildlife:

1. Speak out to defend the Endangered Species Act: Tell your senators and representative to stand up for the Endangered Species Act and oppose any efforts that would further jeopardize our nation's wildlife and wildlands.
2. Protect Yellowstone's grizzly bears: Urge the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to reverse its proposed plans to remove federal Endangered Species Act protections from grizzly bears in the greater Yellowstone region.
3. Save the vaquita: Help save the vaquita — the world's smallest and most endangered porpoise — by boycotting shrimp from Mexico, pressuring a guilty industry to act.
4. Educate yourself: Read about how Trump's proposed budget cut to the Department of the Interior would starve the agency of critical resources needed to recover species and enforce the Endangered Species Act.
5. Stay updated on our fight to save giraffes: Read about NRDC and its partners' recently-submitted petition to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service urging the agency to protect giraffes under the Endangered Species Act.
6. Share on social: Share our special Endangered Species Act graphic to let your friends and family know that you're dedicated to defending the Endangered Species Act and protecting wildlife.

At the same time, the Trump administration is attempting to hand over some of America's most treasured national parks, public lands and oceans to the fossil fuel industry, and has set into motion a plan to open our Arctic and Atlantic coasts to dangerous oil and gas drilling — all of which will have disastrous repercussions for endangered species and other vulnerable wildlife.

We must show the Trump administration and Congress that we will fight to protect imperiled wildlife and wildlands at all costs.

- Sylvia Fallon
Wildlife Conservation Project Director, NRDC

Rep. Martha McSally's response to my e-mail on the Endangered Species Act

Dear Ms. Segal,

Thank you for contacting me regarding your support the Endangered Species Act. I appreciate your thoughts on this important issue.

As you may know, the Endangered Species Act was enacted to increase protection for, and to provide for the recovery of, vanishing wildlife and vegetation. Under ESA, species of plants and animals can be listed as endangered or threatened according to assessments of their risk of extinction. Once a species is listed, powerful legal tools are available to aid its recovery and protect its habitat.

Under the ESA, species are to be listed as threatened or endangered based solely on the best available scientific information, without regard to economic considerations. In many cases, species are protected as subspecies located in only a specific portion of their range – which is why many types of salmon are protected even while salmon is available for our consumption. In the past, the Obama Administration had delisted some wolves from the protections of the Endangered Species Act, allowing them to be hunted.

Congress is faced with the task of balancing these competing interests by protecting wildlife and permitting economic activity and use of lands on which certain wildlife is found. Rest assured that I will keep your support for the ESA in mind should any related legislation come before the full House of Representatives for a vote.

As the 115th Congress addresses the many challenges facing our nation, I hope you will continue to share your thoughts and concerns. To keep up with my work in Congress, you can follow me on Twitter and Facebook, or visit my website at mcsally.house.gov where you can sign up to receive my e-newsletter. Again, thank you for sharing your concerns. Please continue contacting my office regarding issues that you feel are important to you and Southern Arizona.

In Service,

MARTHA McSALLY
Member of Congress