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For Immediate Release
December, 11 2008, 11:29am EDT
Contact:
Cat Lazaroff, 202-772-3270
Bush Administration Leaves a Stained Legacy on Environmental Issues
Weakened protections for wildlife and public lands should be reversed
WASHINGTON
The Bush administration is using its waning days to finalize
regulations that undermine safeguards for wildlife and natural resources and to
build a barrier against Congressional and public challenges to these regulatory
changes, according to testimony delivered to Congress on Thursday.
Jamie Rappaport Clark, executive vice president for Defenders of Wildlife,
testified before the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global
Warming regarding the Bush administration's assault on environmental laws and
the need for the next administration to reverse the damage.
"Given the magnitude of unprecedented challenges that the incoming
administration of President-elect Obama and the Congress will face on the
economy and foreign policy, this hearing is an important means of ensuring that
we do not lose track of the pressing needs created by the Bush administration's
assault on key rules that have guided this nation's stewardship of our
endangered species and public lands," said Clark.
Clark noted a number of attacks on the Endangered Species Act (ESA),
including:
* A proposal to eliminate the requirement that federal
agencies consult with wildlife biologists on the impacts their projects might
have on endangered species;
* Barring consideration of the impacts on
endangered species from actions that contribute to global warming;
and
* A radical new interpretation of the ESA that could allow species
protections to be drawn along political lines such as state boundaries, rather
than along biological imperatives.
Clark also noted a number of other damaging proposals and actions by the Bush
administration including:
* The last-minute repackaging of a "deeply
flawed" rule removing ESA protections from gray wolves in the Northern
Rockies;
* A rule accompanying the polar bear listing under the ESA that
effectively prevents the listing from offering polar bears any meaningful
additional protection;
* Opening areas of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming to
development of oil shale, the very worst fuel source in terms of greenhouse gas
emissions;
* Opening millions of acres of land in Utah for oil and gas
drilling near Arches National Park, Dinosaur National Monument, and Canyonlands
National Park, as well as in areas critical to wildlife and near Native American
archaeological sites; and
* Eliminating any and all Congressional
authority to withdraw federal land parcels from planned developments like oil
drilling or uranium mining.
It will be up to the incoming Obama administration to "erase the stained
natural resources legacy of the Bush administration," Clark said.
Read Jamie Rappaport Clark's full testimony
Defenders of Wildlife is the premier U.S.-based national conservation organization dedicated to the protection and restoration of imperiled species and their habitats in North America.
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Dozens of America's most profitable corporations avoided paying any federal income taxes in 2025, according to an analysis out on Tuesday from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.
The 88 companies—which include Tesla, Southwest Airlines, Live Nation, Palantir, Citigroup, and many others listed in the S&P 500—brought in a collective $105 billion in pretax income last year.
ITEP found that 2025 saw a spike in corporate tax avoidance, enabled in part by new loopholes created by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed by President Donald Trump and by his 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which reduced the corporate tax rate to 21% from its previous 35%.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act is expected to hand the wealthiest 1% of Americans $117 billion in tax cuts this year, while those in the bottom 95% are set to pay more in taxes while facing across-the-board cuts to social safety net programs like Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
It also allowed multimillion- and billion-dollar corporations to find new ways to avoid paying taxes. More than half of the tax-avoiders listed in the report used a provision in the new tax law allowing companies to immediately write off capital investments, reducing their collective taxes by $11.4 billion.
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