April, 07 2014, 04:43pm EDT
House Republicans Hold Anti-Endangered Species Hearing on Bills to Weaken Endangered Species Act
Witnesses Cherry-picked for Hostility to Wildlife Protection
WASHINGTON
House Republicans will hold a hearing Tuesday on four bills that would divert funding from protecting species and discourage citizens from helping enforce the United States' landmark law for protecting endangered wildlife. The four bills would weaken the Endangered Species Act's effectiveness and redirect scarce agency resources from species recovery to pointless reporting requirements. To create a facade of support, Rep. Doc Hastings, the Washington Republican who chairs the House Natural Resources Committee, has invited several witnesses with a long history of outright hostility to endangered species and the Endangered Species Act itself.
"There isn't a single provision -- or even single word -- in any of these bills that would help any species anywhere in the country move toward recovery," said Brett Hartl, endangered species policy director at the Center for Biological Diversity. "Protecting species has never been of genuine interest to Doc Hastings or to the witnesses who will heap praise on these ludicrous Tea Party bills. No one should be fooled by their calls for 'reform,' because all they want to do is weaken the Endangered Species Act and restrict the right of the American public to make sure it's enforced."
The Republican witnesses for this hearing have made a consistent practice of attacking the Act, as follows:
- Dr. Rob Roy Ramey II relied on genetic samples that showed evidence of contamination to determine that the Preble's meadow jumping mouse was not a separate species -- a decision that incorrectly led to a proposal to remove the species from the list of endangered species until an independent peer-review panel of genetics experts determined that "no reliable evidence" supported Ramey's analysis. Ramey was also hired by former Bush administration Deputy Interior Secretary Julie MacDonald, who herself resigned under a cloud of controversy, to write a report that concluded that the Gunnison's sage grouse was not a separate species that could be protected under the Endangered Species Act. The subsequent 2006 decision not to protect the sage grouse was one of 20 decisions investigated in a 2008 Inspector General report on the influence of political considerations on species listings; the increasingly rare bird is now proposed for endangered species protections.
- Karen Budd-Falen has been vocal in her opposition to the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act, and believes that most management of public lands is nothing more than "bullying" to achieve a "cleansing" of rural America. Budd-Falen represents the extreme far-right wing of the Republican Party and has spoken in support of controversial groups such as the "constitutional sheriffs" who refuse to enforce federal laws they believe do not comport with the U.S. Constitution.
- Kent Holsinger is an attorney who represents private industry in cases involving environmental law issues. In a February 2014 news article in Net Right Daily, Holsinger said "If, while hunting for dinner, you instead find an endangered species -- the half-jest, half-serious advice would be 'shoot, shovel and shut up.'"
"It's clear that Doc Hastings is much more interested in pandering to the most extreme, lunatic fringe of the Tea Party than actually finding ways of strengthening the Endangered Species Act," said Hartl. "Tomorrow will be just another dog-and-pony show, not a meaningful discussion on how to put more species on a path to recovery."
At the Center for Biological Diversity, we believe that the welfare of human beings is deeply linked to nature — to the existence in our world of a vast diversity of wild animals and plants. Because diversity has intrinsic value, and because its loss impoverishes society, we work to secure a future for all species, great and small, hovering on the brink of extinction. We do so through science, law and creative media, with a focus on protecting the lands, waters and climate that species need to survive.
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'Authoritarian Bullying': Journalist Arrested at Texas Campus Protest Faces Felony Charge
"Violently arresting journalists and then charging them with felonies is unacceptable," said Seth Stern of the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
Apr 30, 2024
A photojournalist who was violently arrested while covering a pro-Palestine student protest at the University of Texas at Austin last week is reportedly being charged with felony assault on an officer, a charge that press freedom advocates condemned as an obvious attempt to intimidate reporters.
Citing court documents, a local NBC affiliate reported Monday that FOX 7 journalist Carlos Sanchez "faces a charge of assault on a peace officer, a second-degree felony."
"The affidavit said Sanchez lunged toward a Texas Highway Patrol officer, who was on campus assisting the university's police department during its response to the protest, striking him with his camera," according to KXAN. Sanchez was initially taken into custody on criminal trespass charges, which were later dropped.
Videos of Sanchez's arrest and the chaotic moments preceding it went viral on social media last week, with the footage showing Texas state troopers hurling the journalist to the ground with his camera after he appeared to collide with the back of an officer as police attempted to move a group of demonstrators.
Sanchez denied intentionally hitting an officer. The Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) said in a statement Monday that "contrary to the police affidavit in support of the arrest, video of the incident does not show Sanchez intentionally hitting an officer with his camera, and there is no reason why a FOX 7 journalist, who was there to cover the protests, not participate in them, would strike an officer."
FPF said Texas authorities should drop the assault charge immediately.
Guy with camera gets rko’d by police at Palestine protest. #ut #palestine #protest pic.twitter.com/5HI2SU8VKs
— Christopher Kuhlman (@Chris_Kuhlman00) April 24, 2024
Seth Stern, FPF's director of advocacy, said in a statement late Monday that "violently arresting journalists and then charging them with felonies is unacceptable, authoritarian bullying."
"It's doubly bad when police were there to shut down free speech in the first place," said Stern. "Even after law enforcement assaults of journalists covering protests in 2020 resulted in millions in settlement payments, many officers clearly haven't learned their lesson. As even the U.S. Department of Justice has acknowledged, protests are newsworthy, and journalists need to be allowed to cover them and their aftermath, even when protestors are dispersed."
"It's important to keep in mind that none of this would have happened if American universities weren't inviting militarized police forces onto campuses to break up student protests," Stern added. "The police response to the protests—against journalists and students alike—has been far more violent than the protests ever were."
Sanchez's arrest drew swift condemnation from press freedom organizations including the Committee to Protect Journalists, which said last week that it was "very concerned by the violent arrest of a FOX 7 Austin journalist who was simply doing his job and covering matters of public interest."
Ashanti Blaize, president of the Society of Professional Journalists, said the felony charge against Sanchez is "intimidation and retaliation" by Texas authorities, who violently arrested student protesters again on Monday at the University of Texas at Austin campus.
"There will undoubtedly be a chilling effect on journalists who will cover this developing story, not just in Austin, but across TX," Blaize wrote on social media. "The public has a right to know what's happening on the ground, which means journos must be allowed to do their First Amendment-protected jobs without fear of law enforcement interference or threats of arrest and detainment."
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Around 40 peaceful pro-Palestine protesters were arrested Monday on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin as police once again violently cracked down on student-led demonstrations against their school and country's complicity in Israel's genocidal assault on Gaza.
UT students and allies are calling for not only an end to the Gaza genocide but also a suspension of U.S. military aid to Israel and the university's divestment from Israeli investments. Protesters chanted slogans including "We are being peaceful, you are being violent!", "There is no riot here, why are you wearing riot gear?", and "Let them go!" as state troopers aided by local and campus cops dragged, hauled, and even wheeled targeted individuals into custody.
"Our main goal is to get the University of Texas to divest."
Organizers said police used so-called "less-lethal" weapons including flash-bang grenades, mace, and "other chemical munitions" against protesters. National Lawyers' Guild volunteers attempted to collect information from arrestees and inform them of their rights.
"After 205 days of genocide and almost 40,000 Palestinian martyrs, it is shameful that UT continues to invest in mass murder and resorts to brutal intimidation tactics to try to silence its own students, who are bravely taking a stand against genocide," said Lenna Nasr of the Palestinian Youth Movement.
"We demand that UT divest from the Zionist state of Israel and from all institutions and companies that are enabling the current genocide in Gaza," Nasr added. "And, we demand the resignation of [UT president Jay] Hartzell for greenlighting the militarized repression of peaceful student protestors on their own campus."
Mustafa Yowell, a UT engineering student whose father is from Texas and mother is from the occupied West Bank, toldAl Jazeera: "Our main goal is to get the University of Texas to divest. Stop sending money to Israel and divest from companies that profit off of war like Raytheon and Lockheed Martin. It has nothing to do with antisemitism, or Islam, or being Arab. It's about human rights, conflict, and oppression that people face."
Police commanders eventually ordered officers to retreat from the UT campus, sparking a tremendous cheer from demonstrators, who followed and tried to block a bus loaded with arrested protesters.
Arrested students have reported mistreatment in police custody, including incidents of Islamophobia. One young Muslim woman told Al Jazeera that she was denied period products and was forced to wear blood-soiled clothing.
Some students said they did not plan on protesting but felt compelled after witnessing how police treated the nonviolent demonstrators.
"We weren't planning on doing anything like this until we saw students' heads getting smashed into the ground up the road," Joseph Ely, a graduate student and president of the Palestine Solidarity Committee at Texas State University in San Marcos, about 30 miles southwest of Austin, toldKUT News. "It was really the police at the University of Texas that provoked us to do this."
Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott weighed in on the arrests in a social media post declaring that "no encampments will be allowed."
In response, Congressman Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) accused Abbott of "escalating the situation at UT Austin and putting Texas students and journalists in danger."
Monday's arrests follow last week's violent raid on pro-Palestine protesters at UT, during which dozens of people were arrested and at least one journalist and professor were brutalized along with numerous student protesters. Monday's action also came amid a growing wave of nationwide campus demonstrations against the Gaza genocide and complicity by the U.S. government and universities.
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"This is a crisis moment for our democracy," said one campaigner. "We need for our political leaders to become moral leaders and take seriously the needs and priorities of the millions of people struggling simply to survive."
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Leaders of the Poor People's Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival on Monday announced plans for the Mass Poor People & Low-Wage Workers' Assembly & Moral March in Washington, D.C. on June 29, just over four months before the U.S. elections.
The aim of the assembly and march is to "mobilize the one-third of the U.S. electorate who are poor and low-wage infrequent voters" as well as to pressure political leaders to embrace a 17-point agenda during the 2024 election cycle and beyond.
"It does not stand to reason—morally, economically, or politically—that in the richest nation in the history of the world, 800 people die every day from poverty and low wealth," declared Bishop William J. Barber II, co-chair of the Poor People's Campaign and president and senior lecturer of Repairers of the Breach. "Politicians then made the conscious choice to increase poverty to where it was before—an unconscionable reminder that mass poverty is a political choice, not an inevitable law of nature."
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The agenda, revealed during the campaign's Monday press conference, is:
- Abolishing poverty as the fourth-leading cause of death in the U.S.
- A living minimum wage of at least $15+/hour (indexed for inflation)
- Full and expanded voting rights
- No more voter suppression
- Guaranteed workers' rights and labor rights
- Healthcare for all
- Affordable, adequate housing
- Strong social welfare and safety net programs
- An end to gun violence, profit, and proliferation
- Fully protected women's rights
- Environmental justice that secures clean air and water
- Justice for all Indigenous nations
- Fully funded public education
- Just immigration laws
- Addressing militarism and the war economy
- Standing for peace not war; an immediate cease-fire in Gaza that allows humanitarian relief, the release of all hostages, and peace with justice to be pursued; and an end to genocide around the world
- An end to hate, division, and the extremist political agenda
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In addition to Theoharis and Barber's groups, supporters of the assembly and march include the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), Christian Church Disciples of Christ, Common Cause, Fellowship of Affirming Ministries, Good Trouble, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, Make It Plain, National Council of Churches, National Council of Jewish Women, Service Employees International Union, and Union of Southern Service Workers.
"Workers' rights, civil rights, and human rights are on the ballot this election. American voters will decide: Do we want to stay the course and keep on this path toward a more compassionate government or revert back to this morally bankrupt nation?" said Fred Redmond, secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO. "The American labor movement is committed to registering and mobilizing union members and union families around the mass mobilization on June 29. We're going to elect lawmakers who will advocate for workers and poor people to elect leaders who will put people over profits, protect our democracy, and advance worker and civil and human rights."
In addition to choosing between Democratic President Joe Biden and former Republican President Donald Trump, U.S. voters in November will decide which party controls each house of Congress. There will also be various consequential local and state elections, including ballot measures to protect key rights such as access to abortion care.
"This is a crisis moment for our democracy," stressed Rosalyn Pelles, a senior advisor to the Poor People's Campaign. "In order for our nation not to continue down the path of autocracy, we need for our political leaders to become moral leaders and take seriously the needs and priorities of the millions of people struggling simply to survive."
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