Source: United States Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND)
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WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND) issued the following statement on the markup of the Recovering America’s Wildlife Act of 2021 in the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee:
“This Recovering America’s Wildlife Act is a bill I was an original co-sponsor of along with 16 Democrats and 15 other Republicans. I got on this bill because it sent funding to state fish and wildlife agencies to proactively address and keep species off the Endangered Species Act list. It should be the goal of every conservationist. Instead we see from our federal bureaucracy and some of their stakeholders this desire to keep critters on the Endangered Species Act list. I’ve never understood it.”
“In its original form, it put an emphasis on states and what they can do. [States] are more responsive to their constituents and more nimble. Frankly, they’re more attuned to the situation in front of them. Instead, the bill in front of us reduces the money going to states and instead shifts it over to the very people who say ‘if you just give us more money, we can do better for you’ or ‘just give us more money and we can respond in a faster way.’ Forgive my skepticism and the skepticism of the people of North Dakota, but I am so tired of bureaucrats who say if you just give us more, we could help the landowners. I don’t care how fast they do it or how slowly they do it, the outcome is never right.”
“Unfortunately, some of my colleagues blocked these efforts. As a result, this bill has one less supporter.”
Senator Cramer’s amendment would have restored the bill back to its original form, but it was blocked.
During the markup, Senator Cramer highlighted North Dakotans’ experience with the Service.
“I want to take the opportunity to provide some background on the enormous frustration the people of North Dakota have had with the Fish and Wildlife Service. Put simply, the Fish and Wildlife Service is the textbook example of an intransigent bureaucracy which is more interested in its own self-interests than the interests of the citizens of this country. Frankly, they are more interested in their self-interest than they are in their mission. Since I came to Congress in 2013, I have heard not from a few, not from dozens, literally hundreds of landowners in North Dakota, who have had nothing but bad experiences with the Fish and Wildlife Service under every type of administration. Their experience has been disastrous. They’ve had their private property rights trampled on, their personal rights trampled on, their personal safety trampled on by gun-toting, bulletproof vest-wearing SWAT teams that are really biologists pretending to be tough guys, and their livelihoods – in some cases, literally driven to bankruptcy by zealots in the Fish and Wildlife Service. In other words, I have very little faith in the Fish and Wildlife Service,” said Senator Cramer.
Earlier this week, Senator Cramer introduced the Landowner Easement Rights Act with Senators Mike Rounds (R-SD) and John Hoeven (R-ND). The bill addresses problems created by the Service’s abuse of agricultural producers and landowners through Waterfowl Production Area easements.