Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)

Think the Secretary of the Interior wouldn’t sell out our wolves and the Endangered Species Act? Think again.

We now know that Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has been negotiating directly with the governors of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, and we now have strong reason to believe that he is going to propose and promote legislative language to eliminate life-saving protections for wolves in Montana, Idaho, Wyoming and portions of Washington, Oregon, and Utah.

Hundreds of wolves — maybe more than a thousand — could die.Under Salazar’s proposal, wolves wold be delisted and lose federal protection. They would also no longer be subject to the ESA at any time and under any circumstances except at the sole discretion of the Secretary of the Interior.

Don’t let Secretary Salazar sell out our wolves and the Endnagered Species Act. Write your senators and urge them to oppose this awful plan.

And no longer would it be possible for the American public to propose protection for wolves no matter how critically imperiled they become. And once the Endnagered Species Act is weakened in such a way, it would invite futrther outrages… dealing a serious blow to the very foundation of the Endangered Species Act, the bedrock conservation law in this country.

Help save the lives of wolves and protect the Endangered Species Act. Please take action now.

Despite being the nation’s chief steward for endangered species, Secretary Salazar has demonstrated little to no concern for the Endangered Species Act, so we have no confidence that he –- or perhaps any future Secretary of the Interior –- would ever conclude that there is a need to restore ESA protection for wolves, no matter how egregious state efforts to reduce wolf numbers may be.

This problem began when Secretary Salazar –- freshly appointed to office and against the advice of numerous environmental groups and senior members of Congress –- who all said his action would be illegal, approved the Bush plan for removing federal protections for wolves. As predicted, he lost the lawsuit and federal protections for wolves was restored.

Were the Secretary’s current proposal to be enacted, it would set a horrible precedent for further legislative weakening of the Act that could easily lead to the total unraveling of the Act, and by itself would constitute by far the worst damage ever done to the ESA and to the cause of conserving biological diversity under any previous administration, Democrat or Republican.

This is an Endangered Species Act emergency. Please take action now!

We don’t have much time to make our voices hear. Please write your senators now.

For the Wildlife Ones,

Rodger Schlickeisen
President
Defenders of Wildlife

Filed under: CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional |