Protect the Integrity of the Endangered Species Act

This July 4th, we celebrate the founding of America and what we stand for. One of the greatest things we, Americans, stand for is the protection of our precious wildlife. The Endangered Species Act is the world’s most successful and powerful conservation law. The Endangered Species Act is extremely effective because it relies on a foundation of peer-reviewed, best available science in its listing, consultation, recovery and delisting decisions. Thanks to its effectiveness, more than 99 percent of the nearly 1,800 U.S. animals and plants protected by it have been saved from extinction. Today, our children and grandchildren can still see bald eagles, American alligators, brown pelicans, Channel island foxes, stellar sea lions, Tennessee purple coneflowers, and humpback whales in the wild thanks to the Act. The Endangered Species Act works.

The Endangered Species Act is a profoundly popular law that represents fundamental American principles. Polling over the past ten years has consistently shown that overwhelming majorities of American voters across party lines support the Endangered Species Act. The most recent poll shows that 90 percent of voters support the Endangered Species Act, including 96 percent of self-identified liberals and 82 percent of self-identified conservatives. Despite the Endangered Species Act’s tremendous success and popularity, it is under threat from industry groups and other wildlife opponents. A small yet vocal sector of the regulated community seeks to undermine and weaken the core principles of the Act, just so they can improve their bottom line. We cannot allow the Act to be weakened under the guise of soft-sounding catch phrases such as “reforms” or “tweaks.” Using misleading words such as “update,” “modernize,” or “reform,” the Act’s opponents in Congress ultimately seek to undermine its core principles, gut its scientific basis, and abandon its common-sense approach to conserving imperiled wildlife.

The Endangered Species Act helps to maintain the foundations of life for the American people and their families. By protecting healthy communities of plants and animals, it provides key ecosystem services and benefits including clean air, clean water, food, pollination, and medicines. And by preserving millions of acres of forests, wetlands and beaches threatened by environmental degradation and destruction, the Act helps to protect vulnerable human communities from environmental challenges.