The Obama administration banned imports of trophies from Zimbabwe in 2014 after finding that Zimbabwe's management of trophy hunting did not enhance the survival of the African elephant in the wild.  

Donald Trump's administration decided to allow the remains of endangered elephants legally hunted in Zimbabwe and Zambia to be imported into the United States of America.  

Elephants are listed as threatened under the US Endangered Species Act and importing ivory into America is banned unless certain conditions are met.

Leopards, Lions, Rhino and Giraffes are endangered species.  Trophies from hunts killing these animals are still entering the USA from Africa. 

Trump has argued that hunting could help conservation efforts while science confirms that hunting is driving megafauna to extinction. 

The USA failed to support a proposal brought by 32 African countries to halt the export of baby elephants from Africa  to Zoos in foreign countries in Geneva at CITES CoP18 in 2019.

The USA failed to support parties at the CITES Standing Committee Meeting in Lyon, France in March 2022 with regard to the capture of wild elephants in Africa for export to zoos in the UAE.

President Masisi of Botswana lifted the moratorium on  elephant trophy hunting in Botswana.  In 2020 he permitted  the killing of 272 elephants  by trophy hunters. These hunts were auctioned off to the highest bidders in Canada, the USA, in Botswana and in Europe.  

In November 2022, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed a revision to the rule for the African elephant under section 4(d) of the Endangered Species Act (ESA). In response to the increase in international trade of live elephants, particularly of wild-sourced elephants, they aimed to ensure activities with live African elephants under U.S. jurisdiction contribute to enhancing the conservation of the species and do not contribute to the decline in populations of the species in the wild. They are also are working to ensure that live African elephants in the United States are humanely and appropriately cared throughout their lifetimes.

In 1994 there was international outcry when four individually known elephants, subjects of the Amboseli Elephant Research Project, were shot by trophy hunters on the Tanzanian side of the border.

In 1995 a moratorium on trophy hunting of this cross-border elephant population was agreed between nations.

In late 2023, however, two adult males with tusks reportedly weighing over 100 lbs. were shot south of the border in Tanzania, ending a 30-year trophy hunting moratorium. A third elephant was shot in the same area in late February 2024 and, as of 10 March 2024.

A further three licenses are said to have been granted raising alarm and putting the integrity of the Amboseli elephant population in jeopardy.

We are appealing for a blanket ban on the import of elephant trophies into the United States of America in order to save the critically endangered super tuskers.