KILLING bears and wolves (including nursing mothers and their cubs) while they are sleeping.  That is what the Fish and Wildlife Service has approved for Kenai National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. This gives anyone that obtains a hunting license a now legal means to murder animals that are supposed to be under the protection of The Wilderness Act of 1964.

The incident in the above picture will be commonplace now. In the video, from which this picture is captured, you can hear the heartbreaking screams and cries of the murdered Mother bear's newborn cubs -who they also murdered (what crime did these babies commit? What threat did they pose?), you can see the men "high fiving" each other, you can see them pointing the gun into the den, you can see them dragging the mother's lifeless body out, you can hear them saying, "You and me we don't f*ck around, we go where we want to kill sh*t."

These men made unfettered comments - unbeknownst to them that they were on camera. These men are HUNTERS, they represent the true nature of hunters.  Forget the romanticized version of hunters that hunting groups and others project to the public. Hunting is gruesome, cruel, barbaric and targets animals that are just trying to survive in their own habitats. Wildlife Refuges were the last bastion of safety for animals. That is now gone in Alaska. This also sets a dangerous precedent for other states to follow suit.

In fact, it has already been happening all over Alaska's 16 National Refuges covering 76 million acres.  In 2017, Alaska Congressman, Don Young proposed H.J. Resolution 69 which overturned the Federal Rule of no hunting in Alaska's Wildlife Refuges.  Young's House floor argument of "States Rights" was a smoke and mirrors attempt to deflect from the real reason:  Giving cart blanche to hunters to decimate the populations of grizzly bears, brown/black bears and coyotes.

The methods?:  A Machiavellian practice of baiting bears with doughnuts, popcorn and other food, and sneaking up on hibernating and sleeping animals to then shoot them execution style; using barbaric steel-jawed leg hold traps (which leave the animal in excruciating pain for days, wherein they try to gnaw off their paw or leg stuck in the trap), neck snares that slowly strangle the entangled animal; and using planes to spot and shoot animals.

Congressman Young stated that, 'State's Rights were being infringed upon by The Rule and that if Alaskans weren't happy with the work he's doing, they should stop re-electing him.'  Perhaps it is time the 87 year old Congressman, who has represented Alaska since 1973 and 24 terms, step down to give animals a much needed break from his devastating decades of anti-animal policies.  He said he personally killed wolves in their dens for federal pay years ago.  Another one of his Bills: HR224, sought to amend the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 to allow importation of Polar Bear trophies taken in sport hunts in Canada.

"State's Rights" are a misrepresentation of the intention of The Wilderness Act that clearly cited the importance of protecting certain lands in their natural condition. "An area where the earth and it's community [animals] are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain."

Alaska's proponents of killing animals on federally protected lands espouse terms such as "sport hunting," "harvest," "taken," "wildlife dependent recreation," while in another breath beckoning the public with such empty platitudes as "...The American public can develop an appreciation for fish and wildlife."  There are numerous activities people can engage in that do not involve the harming of wildlife.  In regards to hunting - Conservation and Maintaining or "managing certain species" to protect other species are fallacies.  Hunters hunt for the thrill and for blood lust with no care whatsoever to the devastating effects on all the animals and THEIR families that they kill.  (We see the absolute proof in the above picture/video.) 

Stats for 2018 reveal that only 5% of Americans hunt. 15.6 million hunting licenses were granted.  That is a small percentage of our 328 million population.  The population of Alaska is 731,545 of which there are 175,545 hunters - 24% of the Alaskan population.

Politicians such as Alaskan Senator, Lisa Murkowski said, [The Rule was] "bad for Alaska, bad for our native peoples, bad for America." (It is not surprising that she is a hunter).  She is not only wrong but in contempt of The Wilderness Act and the entire population of the United States.  The American tax payers fund all federally protected lands.  John Schoen, retired Wildlife Biologist, Alaska Dept. of Fish & Game stated, "These areas are national interest lands belonging to all Americans, not just Alaska resident hunters."

Please help us enact our right to overturn this Bill and to present OUR wishes to the 193 House members who voted against this atrocity.  Please help us send a clear message to the 225 House members who voted Yes - (and others), that we will not stand for politicians using bully tactics to enact laws that only benefit a small segment of the population. NO politician has the right to play favoritism with any group such as hunters, in this case, and deny due diligence to the rest of the population, that strongly disagrees with this.

Please sign and share this petition. Thank you!