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RMEF, Sportsmen’s Alliance File Brief in Support of Yellowstone Grizzly Management

July 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Press Release from the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation:

MISSOULA, Mont.—The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation and Sportsmen’s Alliance Foundation filed a joint summary judgement brief supporting a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decision to remove federal protections from the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) grizzly bear population.

“We stand alongside the Sportsmen’s Alliance and our fellow conservation organizations in supporting federal scientists and wildlife biologists who declared the grizzly population fully recovered,” said Kyle Weaver, RMEF president and CEO. “The next step is keeping grizzly management under the umbrella of state agencies that manage all wildlife in accordance with the North American Wildlife Conservation Model, which uses hunting as a management tool.”

“Despite the emotional rhetoric of the animal rights crowd, the time has come to return this population of bears to state management,” said Evan Heusinkveld, Sportsmen’s Alliance president and CEO. “The truth is, this is a historic moment for the species and the Endangered Species Act as a whole. Returning the Yellowstone area population of bears to state management should be a monumental achievement widely celebrated as a conservation success story.”

Numbering more than 700, the Yellowstone grizzly population meets all delisting criteria. These factors include not only the number and distribution of bears throughout the ecosystem, but also the quantity and quality of the habitat available and the states’ commitments to manage the population in a manner that maintains its healthy and secure status.

RMEF and its partners helped permanently protect more than 169,000 acres of vital wildlife habitat valued at more than $131 million in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Additionally, RMEF also directly contributed more than $3.1 million and leveraged an additional $17.5 million to help enhance wildlife habitat on more than 426,000 acres in the GYE. RMEF also contributed more than $1 million in funding and leveraged an additional $10 million from conservation partners to carry out 118 GYE wildlife management and wildlife research projects.

“These projects are crucial and helped to contribute to the understanding of wildlife populations, ecology and habitat needs, including increasing the understanding of grizzly bears and conserving the habitat needed for them to thrive in conjunction with all wildlife populations,” said Weaver. “Habitat needs to remain the focus of on-the-ground conservation work, not seemingly non-stop litigation.”

The federal judge laid out a schedule that includes several more filing deadlines as well as a hearing in late August. He has stated he will make a ruling before the hunting season begins in September.

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Filed Under: Endangered Species, Endangered Species Act, National/World, Predators Tagged With: , , ,

NRA Sues Governor Cuomo

May 16, 2018 by Leave a Comment

*Editor’s Note* – And good luck with that. Although, neither the NRA nor the Governor needs any luck as I’m convinced this “lawsuit” (wink-wink) is nothing more than a dog and pony show.

On Friday, May 11, 2018, in the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York, the NRA filed a lawsuit claiming  that Gov. Cuomo, and his Director of Financial Services (DFS) have engaged in a “campaign of selective prosecution, backroom exhortations, and public threats” designed to coerce banks and insurance companies to withhold services from the NRA.

The NRA argues that such tactics vastly overstep DFS’s regulatory mandate, and seek to suppress the speech of Second Amendment supporters and retaliate against the NRA and others for their political advocacy.

The lawsuit seeks millions of dollars in damages to redress harms inflicted by the DFS campaign.

Among other things, the lawsuit cites a pair of “guidance” letters issued on April 19, 2018, by the DFS to the CEOs of banks and insurance companies doing business in New York.  Styled as regulatory “risk management” advisories, the letters encourage institutions to “take prompt actions” to manage “reputational risk” posed by dealings with “gun promotion organizations.”

The same day, Cuomo issued a press release in which the Director directly urged “all insurance companies and banks doing business in New York” to “discontinue their arrangements with the NRA.”

Read a copy of the lawsuit complaint as filed, here:

https://www.nraila.org/media/2543/file-stamped-complaint.pdf

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Maine Lynx Trapping Case Ends with Anti-Hunters Conceding Defeat

July 17, 2017 by 2 Comments

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit officially dismissed an appeal brought by animal-rights organizations concerning the trapping of Canada lynx in Maine, likely ending a multi-year, multi-lawsuit court battle concerning the protections offered the predator in the state.<<<Read More>>>

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Filed Under: Endangered Species, Endangered Species Act, Maine Hunting News, Predators, Trapping Tagged With: , , ,

Oregon Court Accepts RMEF’s Brief in Wolf Lawsuit

February 20, 2017 by Leave a Comment

*Editor’s Note* – It is not clear from RMEF’s quote by CEO and President David Allen, “We stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, its professional biologists and wildlife managers, and the Fish and Wildlife Commission in carrying out their duty of managing all of Oregon’s wildlife,” precisely what this means. Certainly, one should not expect that the RMEF would blindly and willingly support and approve every action of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW). So, I am assuming this statement is in reference ONLY to supporting the ODFW in thwarting the lawsuit brought on by environmentalists.

However, the presser below further describes the State of Oregon’s management plan for wolves offering protections of wolves that obviously involve promoting them within settled landscapes.

In a recent article I was reading on the Wolf Education International website, the world organization posted it’s position specifically about the perpetuation and protection of wild or semi-wild hybrid canines and in general concerning doing so in settled landscapes, which essentially encourages conflicts with people, as well as property destruction, and the encouragement of further hybridization of the canine species.  Here is that WEI position statement: “It is the position of the majority members of Wolf Education International that the breeding, perpetuation and protection of hybrid, and/or canine mixtures, in the wild and under the claim of sustaining a wolf species or subspecies, is wrong scientifically as well as poses a direct threat to public safety, health, and private property. WEI supports sustaining real wolves in wild places, where they are acceptable to those communities asked to live with them not in settled landscapes where conflicts with the full range of human presence, human activities, and the costs of managing wolves and their impacts are not acceptable and sensibly judged to be prohibitive.”

I would at least encourage the RMEF, if they don’t already, to consider publicly supporting (and making a statement) this position of the members of Wolf Education International to stop forcing any wild canines into settled landscapes. Showing support for this continued action not only perpetuates a continued threat to human safety and health, and the destruction of property, but is just as seriously is destroying the very wolf species they are trying to protect. It makes little sense at all.

Press Release from the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation:

MISSOULA, Mont.—The Oregon Court of Appeals granted the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation’s application to file a friend-of-the-Court brief in a lawsuit by animal rights groups seeking to eliminate state wildlife management in Oregon.

“We stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, its professional biologists and wildlife managers, and the Fish and Wildlife Commission in carrying out their duty of managing all of Oregon’s wildlife,” said David Allen, RMEF president and CEO. “Oregon’s science-based wolf plan indicates wolves reached delisting criteria five years ago.”

As of December 31, 2015, Oregon’s minimum wolf population estimate numbered 110, marking a 26 percent increase over the 2014 population and a 42 percent increase since 2013. Biologists also indicate the actual number of wolves currently in Oregon is likely greater than the minimum estimate.

The Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission voted to delist wolves from the state Endangered Species Act (ESA) in November of 2015. The Oregon legislature ratified the commission’s decision by passing a bill, which was later signed into law, removing wolves from the state’s endangered species list. Those moves had no immediate effect on wolf management yet animal rights groups still filed suit seeking to reverse the delisting.

The state’s Wolf Conservation and Management Plan continues to guide management of the population in the western two-thirds of Oregon with ESA-like protections that prohibit the killing of any wolf. In northeast Oregon, where most of the wolves are found, the plan emphasizes non-lethal deterrence measures to resolve livestock conflicts but allows ranchers to shoot wolves caught in the act.

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Filed Under: Game Management, National/World, Predators, Rights Tagged With: , , , , ,

Sportsmen’s Alliance, Maine Trappers Victorious in Lynx Lawsuit

February 16, 2017 by Leave a Comment

Press Release from the Sportsmen’s Alliance:

On Wednesday, Feb. 15, U.S. District Judge Jon Levy issued his ruling in a lawsuit that sought to revoke the state of Maine’s Incidental Take Permit (ITP), which would open individual trappers to Endangered Species Act (ESA) violations. Judge Levy ruled the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s use and application of ITPs were lawful and in keeping with the requirements of the ESA.

The ruling is a clear victory for the Sportsmen’s Alliance Foundation, trappers in Maine and the Maine Department of Inland Fish and Wildlife. In his ruling, Judge Levy found that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s “actions were in keeping with the requirements of the Endangered Species Act…the National Environmental Policy Act…and the Administrative Procedure Act…”

“We are extremely pleased that District Court Judge Levy has sided with reasonable and responsible management,” said Evan Heusinkveld, Sportsmen’s Alliance president and CEO. “Today’s clear ruling is nothing short of a full victory for trappers, but also hunters and anglers, too. This case had far-reaching implications for how Endangered Species Act policies would be implemented. If anti-hunting organizations can ban all trapping in the areas where protected lynx are found, what[sic] would stop them from banning fishing in streams or rivers that contain[sic] endangered fish species?”

The case, filed by the anti-hunting and anti-trapping groups Center for Biological Diversity, the Wildlife Alliance of Maine, the Animal Welfare Institute and Friends of Animals, was essentially a backdoor attempt to use the Endangered Species Act to stop trapping in the state. At the heart of the legal battle were Incidental Take Permits, which are granted under the ESA and provide for limited, incidental taking of federally protected species. Without such protection, individual trappers and state wildlife agencies could be held liable for ESA violations every time a lynx was accidentally caught in a legal trap.

“Today is a great day for Maine trappers, and this judgment vindicates the great work of the Maine Department of Inland Fish and Wildlife,” said James Cote, director of government affairs for the Maine Trappers Association. “We are so pleased with this outcome, which is positive for trappers and Canada[sic] lynx alike, and that wouldn’t have been possible without our partnership with the Sportsmen’s Alliance.”

Canada lynx, which are listed as a threatened species in the U.S. due to fragmented populations at the southernmost range of their habitat, are abundant north of the border in Canada. In fact, there are many who believe that the lynx populations should be removed from the ESA altogether.

This is not the first time that the Sportsmen’s Alliance and Maine trappers have prevailed in trapping litigation. In 2010, we successfully defended against a similar lawsuit that also tried to use the Endangered Species Act to stop trapping. That case paved the way for trapping to continue.

Joining the Sportsmen’s Alliance Foundation in the most recent case was the Maine Trappers Association and the National Trappers Association.

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Filed Under: Endangered Species, Endangered Species Act, Legal/historical, Maine Hunting News, Trapping Tagged With: , , ,

Can non-native wolves receive protections reserved for native species in Oregon?

January 11, 2017 by 1 Comment

“Later this year the Oregon Court of Appeals will consider whether it was lawful for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission to remove the gray wolf from the state’s endangered species list in late 2015. Disagreeing with the wolf’s delisting, three environmentalist groups challenged it last year. PLF represents the Oregon Cattlemen’s Association and the Oregon Farm Bureau Federation as intervenors defending the delisting, and today we filed a brief responding to the environmentalist groups’ challenge to the delisting.

Our brief focuses on two primary arguments: Oregon was legally compelled to delist the wolf because the only wolves present in the state are members of a non-native wolf subspecies, but the Oregon Endangered Species Act (ESA) only protects species native to Oregon; and when analyzing the status of species under the Oregon ESA, the state must consider a species’ current range, not its historical range.”<<<Read More>>>

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Filed Under: Endangered Species, Endangered Species Act, National/World, Predators Tagged With: , , , , ,

Highly Questionable Turkey, Open Border & Greater Tribal Sovereignty Policies Together Undermine U.S. National Security

December 21, 2015 by Leave a Comment

*Editor’s Comment* – The linked-to “Working Paper” is an interesting read and one that should challenge readers to get to work to discover the real Truth in what is being discussed. As always, to me it is interesting when someone, innocent or otherwise, begins to discover things that raise eyebrows, the result being a compilation of interesting information presented as “facts” and “public information.” The difficulty with this, and I certainly am not questioning the author’s work, is that for Truth Seekers, we know that much of the “facts” and “public information” are lies and full of distractions. It becomes necessary to sort over what tidbits are the truth and which parts are lies intended to distract. For this reason readers need to get to work to discover what is truth based on real events and not based on media presentations, or even what the Government tells us.

I have not taken the time to research this entire paper, and I’m not sure I will, at least not immediately, as my time is usually focused on other matters, albeit matters that ultimately link to a common source. Which brings me to my only comment about the Working Paper that I will offer readers who are truly interested.

In part of the information, the authors mention that ISIS gets most of their funding from the “illegal” sale of crude oil – the sale of which is mostly handled by Turkey and then re-marketed to other clients. This has been offered many times and treated as common knowledge in the Press and elsewhere, even though it shouldn’t be. If nothing else and before anyone can begin to comprehend the depth of power and complexity of this, of which the Working Paper, in my opinion, has only scratched the surface, you have to understand that the ONLY way that ISIS could be selling oil to Turkey and then getting resold on the open market to fund ISIS, is because it is ALLOWED to do so.

Keep that in mind when reading this Paper and any subsequent research you might intend to do. If you also are one that chooses to trust the United States Government and their partners, unwilling to think otherwise, my recommendation for you is to not read the rest of this page or the working paper.

Abstract:

On September 4, and 9, 2015, the Associated Press released an article that dismissed and effectively ridiculed national security allegations contained in the previous lawsuit my co-counsel and I had filed on September 2, 2015, on behalf of two Montana State Senators and a Montana-based recreational enterprise. The AP article authored by journalist Matthew Volz was distributed over domestic and international newswires and appeared in web media as far away as Europe, the Middle East and Singapore. Mr. Volz and the AP were ostensibly offended that our lawsuit challenged the U.S. government’s approval of the virtually condition-free transfer of a “black start,” “category 3 hazard” hydroelectric powered dam (the Kerr Dam) to a “federally recognized” Native American tribe – the Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes (CSKT) of the Flathead Indian Reservation located in northwestern, Montana.

As the direct result of this reporting, we counsels and our clients had been castigated by the U.S. State Department and by the local liberal press as racially biased and conspiracy minded. This eventually caused our clients to seek voluntary withdrawal of this action. However, as subsequent publicly available facts have come to light, it has become more apparent that our lawsuit had actually struck a sensitive chord within the Obama administration by publicly exposing highly questionable policies that officials preferred remained covered up.

This Working Paper endeavors to relate the national security-oriented facts and allegations contained in our prior lawsuit to subsequently discovered publicly available information concerning the administration’s Turkey, open borders, and greater tribal sovereignty policies and initiatives. It then cross-analyzes these otherwise distinct and separate policy areas to show how their implementation together serves to undermine U.S. national security and the security of Montanans.

Given Turkey nuclear ambitions and Obama administration support therefor, Erdogan and Obama administration support of the Muslim Brotherhood and ISIS, Obama administration open border policies benefiting Middle Eastern refugees, Mexican drug cartels and Latin American migrants, and Obama administration federal Indian policies promoting expansive tribal sovereignty at the expense of U.S. constitutional protections and federal and state laws, reasonable persons can conclude that our prior lawsuit’s allegations against Turkey were rather prescient, and that, consequently, U.S. national security and the security of Montanans are being greatly undermined. Moreover, reasonable persons can conclude that failure to act to protect Montanans’ rights may imply for those who we oppose, that we are complicit in their objectives. For this reason, we are currently drafting a new lawsuit that seeks redress for the harms our new clients continue to suffer as the result of these and other questionable administration policies.<<<To the Working Paper>>>

 

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Filed Under: Montana Hunting News, Politics in General Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Perverted Environmentalists Sue Over Wolf Hunts Where No Wolves Were Harmed

November 19, 2015 by 2 Comments

*Editor’s Note* – I told you so! If it wasn’t for the fact that the greatest interest of the Environmentalists is making money, one would have to wonder what all the fuss is about. An Idaho sportsman’s organization held two wolf hunting derbies for two consecutive years and manage to kill no wolves. Yet, insane and money-grubbing, environMENTAL, fake animal rights groups are suing the U.S. Government to stop the killing…er, or maybe they are suing to get more money and use the cause to lie, cheat and steal by playing on the emotions of brain dead “humans” to get their money.

Steve Alder of Idaho for Wildlife said the group isn’t holding its Predator Hunting Contest this winter because hunters were unable to kill any wolves the previous two winters.”We don’t care about lawsuits, but we failed miserably at harvesting a wolf,” Alder said. “There’s no point getting sponsorships and doing this and that and not being able to get a wolf.”The group overcame lawsuits to hold the events on private land and U.S. Forest Service land the past two winters.

Source: Feds face lawsuits over Idaho wolf-killing derby | Local & Regional | Boise, Meridian, Nampa, Caldwell, Idaho News, Weather, Sports and Breaking News – KBOI 2

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Maine Lynx Protection: The Absurdity Never Ends

August 18, 2015 by Leave a Comment

We knew it was coming…I knew it was coming and here it is. Another lawsuit. All previous attempts at placating the perverted animal righters (better recognized as hunting haters and people haters) have failed in these people’s eyes and as has been predicted for decades now, they will not stop until it has all ended…laws and courts be goddamned!

It should say something that when many of these same idiots who filed a lawsuit against Maine to end trapping before, hidden behind the lie of protecting the Canada lynx, agreed to a compromise until such time as Maine could acquire a legal Incidental Take Permit (ITP), are saying it’s not enough. It must be pointed out as well that the guidelines worked out in the ITP are more strict than the Consent Decree; so much so that the ITP is ridiculous and was designed to foster additional lawsuits. That’s what the disease of Environmentalism does for us.

And yet, here we are, once again, about to embark on another costly court case disguised as a need to protect a species that needs no protection. Anyone with a brain would understand that more lynx will be “incidentally” caught and more run over by cars than ever before because the creature is over-protected and Maine is over-populated with lynx. But let’s not allow sense and sensibility to get in the way.

Perhaps we should give these clowns what they want. When the moose and the lynx have all disappeared because the clear-cut forests have all disappeared, who or what will they point a finger at in order to receive another pay day?

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Filed Under: Commentary/Opinion, Endangered Species, Endangered Species Act, Maine Hunting News, Predators Tagged With: , ,

Wildlife groups sue to stop Maine’s trapping season to protect Canada lynx

August 18, 2015 by Leave a Comment

Three nonprofit groups file a federal lawsuit against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for allowing Maine to issue trapping permits.

Source: Wildlife groups sue to stop Maine’s trapping season to protect Canada lynx – The Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram

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Filed Under: Endangered Species, Maine Hunting News, Maine Outdoor News, Trapping Tagged With: , , ,