Readers of the prestigious
Washington Post woke to an alarming
headline last week announcing the Republican Administration’s intent to gut
and/or dismantle the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA). This was not
sensationalist journalism but, sadly, our new reality. In fact, Senate
Republicans held a hearing on February 15, 2017 to effectively begin the
process of weakening the ESA, an Act that was first signed into law in 1973. Chairing
that hearing was Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming, who has a history of
favouring the oil and gas industry over environmental issues.
The Republicans’ war on wildlife
is nothing new. They have been waging this war for a very long time. They have
always viewed Nature as a direct threat to business, private land ownership and
the profitability of resource exploitation industries such as logging and
mining. Indeed, “since the Republicans took control of the House of
Representatives in 2011, they have made 233 legislative attempts to either
dismantle the Act or target specific endangered species.” (Source:
IFLScience)
New this time around, however, is
the fact that the Republicans are now in full control of the conversation.
Politically speaking, that is. The average American, we are told, probably
doesn’t agree with too much tampering to the existing ESA. It has been
reported
that the vast majority of Americans (fully 90%) support the Act, this according
to a national poll conducted in 2015.
For more than 40 years America’s ESA
has been successfully protecting species, including its iconic national symbol,
the bald eagle. It has also brought the American alligator, the Stellar sea
lion, the peregrine falcon and many, many other plant and animal species back
from the brink of extinction. Data from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
indicates that the ESA has saved 99% of listed species from extinction. In
fact, scientists say that some 227 species would already be extinct without it.
(Source:
Center for Biological
Diversity)
What does all this mean for
Canada and Canadian wildlife?
We share this beautiful continent
with our neighbours to the south, so what happens in the USA unfortunately
doesn’t always stay in the USA. Already, biologists have pointed out the sheer
lunacy of building a wall between the U.S. and Mexico. Wildlife does not know
what a border is and migration routes traverse all three nations on this
continent.
Here, around the Great Lakes, we
are particularly jittery about the Republicans’ next steps and any successful
attempt at destroying their ESA. We share the Great Lakes with the United
States, and if biodiversity and the ecological integrity of the Great Lakes
region — its watersheds, wetlands and deciduous forests — are in jeopardy to
the south of us, it is going to most definitely impact the bio stability of the
entire region eventually. Just as frightening would be the concurrent weakening
of America’s EPA (Environmental Protection Agency). Increased pollution and
contamination, and an uptake in fossil fuel extraction, coal mining and fracking
combined with a much-weakened ESA are a recipe for ecological and environmental
disaster in the long term.
I don’t believe this is an
exaggeration or alarmist rhetoric. So much of wild North America is under threat
as it is. Many species are teetering on the brink while others are losing
ground – literally – every day. Biodiversity is a fragile and interconnected
web, so the loss of just one species affects all others. Those species that are
on the brink and losing the battle need even more protection, not less. They
will surely falter if protections are pulled.
Then, there is the war that
Republicans feel is their right to wage – their manifest destiny – to eliminate any species (humans included) that
stands in the way of their worldview, their progress, their profits. Native species
in their rifle sights include most notably wolves, coyotes, cougars and bears.
We should not forget to add to any list of beleaguered species under attack the
west’s wild mustangs and wild burros, regularly rounded up by the Bureau of
Land Management (BLM).
The carnage is going to be
gruesome.
North America is one continent.
Our mountain ranges, our prairies, our lakes and our forests do not recognize
borders. Wildlife crosses freely, oblivious to the politics of their survival
or demise. Their only hope is our attention, our awareness and our advocacy.
Hands across the border, we must reach out to our fellow environmentalists in
the U.S. and show our support for their efforts and for their resistance –
organizations such as the wonderful
Center
for Biological Diversity or the Canadian/American cooperative,
Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative – to
name but two.
Even as we in Ontario face some
battles over Ontario’s ESA in the current climate in which Wynne’s economic woes
threaten to outweigh her government’s obligation to the ESA, we must not ignore
what is happening in the U.S. Other countries may easily mock the Trump
Administration; they can rail and rant and dismiss him as unstable or
incompetent. He is. That’s not in question. But Canada is the only other
country in the world together with Mexico that will directly bear the brunt of
the brutal, short-sighted machinations of the new U.S. Administration. The
health and wellbeing of the entire continent is at stake if the ESA and the EPA
are vitiated.
We may stand some distance from the border, but we must, however, stand in opposition to any gutting of America’s
ESA if we care at all about North American wildlife – indeed, if we care at all about the future of life on
earth. It is incumbent upon us to be vigilant and to work harder than ever as
advocates for the voiceless. As my
Twitter
community of friends and followers would say – it’s time to #resist.
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