House Committee Moves to Gut the Endangered Species Act

WASHINGTON (Sept. 12, 2017) – The House Natural Resources Committee will be marking up five separate anti-Endangered Species Act bills in committee today and tomorrow. The bills – H.R. 424, “Gray Wolf State Management Act;” H.R. 717 “Listing Reform Act;” H.R. 1274 “State, Tribal, and Local Species Transparency Recovery Act;” H.R. 2603 “Saving America’s Endangered Species Act;” and H.R. 3131 “Endangered Species Litigation Reasonableness Act” – would undermine the Endangered Species Act and the species that benefit from its protections by prioritizing politics over science and undercutting citizens’ ability to help enforce the law.

The following statement is from Jamie Rappaport Clark, Former president and CEO of Defenders of Wildlife:

“Today’s markup continues a longstanding effort by some in Congress to gut and repeal our nation’s most effective law in protecting endangered species from extinction. It is death by five cuts, legislation that does nothing to improve the Endangered Species Act, only slash away at its ability to save species and their habitat. Each of these bills will have devastating effects on the law that has helped us to save gray wolves, Florida manatees, California condors, loggerhead sea turtles and hundreds of other species of endangered wildlife. With the current extinction crisis faced by our planet, we need a strong and intact Endangered Species Act. It is a shameful move, and we urge every thoughtful member of this committee to vote against these bills.”