Is the Biden administration about to betray America’s sportsmen and women?
Despite lauding $1.5 billion generated in new conservation funding by America’s anglers and hunters, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) could soon settle with the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), a preservationist environmental group, to negotiate away public lands access.
I warned in a recent Townhall column about the adverse effects of closing off 2.3 million public land acres to new fishing and hunting opportunities.
CBD is also urging USFWS to ban lead bullets and fishing tackle on National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) lands. A senior attorney for the agency recently hinted this option isn’t off the table. Should CBD vs USFWS proceed, it’ll be a wholesale attack on public lands.
Much to CBD’s dismay, hunting is permitted—and welcomed— on NWR lands.
“Hunting is a healthy, traditional recreational use of renewable natural resources deeply rooted in America’s heritage, and it can be an important wildlife management tool,” notes the USFWS website. “The National Wildlife Refuge System Administration Act of 1966, the National Wildlife Refuge System Improvement Act of 1997, other laws, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s policy permit hunting on a national wildlife refuge when it is compatible with the purposes for which the refuge was established and acquired.”