Why Interior's Post-Virus Plan is Lots of Hunting

per Billion, the environmental podcast from Bloomberg Law. As always, I'm your host, David Schultz, and my cat is hanging out in the windowsill next to me right now, so if he does anything weird, sorry, So everyone's focus right now is on how to stop this pandemic, as it should be, but some federal agencies are already making plans

for what to do after it's over. Last week, the Fish and Wildlife Service put forth a plan that would open up two point three million acres of federal lands for hunting during this year's fall season, that includes lands within ninety seven federal wildlife refugees. Here to talk about what this means and why it's happening is Bobby McGill, who covers wildlife and natural resources for Bloomberg Law. Bobby, how are you doing doing well? How are you? I'm okay.

So before we get into exactly what the ficial Wildlife Service is proposing here. Explain to me exactly how hunting works here, because when I hear federal wildlife refuges, I would think that would mean that you can't hunt in a refuge, you know, So what's going on here? How does this work? So hunting and national wildlife refuges has a very, very long and tortured history laying on me.

The difference between now and you know, say, back in the nineteen twenties, thirties and forties, is that most refuges are now open to some level of hunting. And it's not the same thing everywhere. Every what's able to be hunted in one refuge is different than another. But here's

the thing. Federal law basically closes everything to hunting, except that the Secretary of Interior can decide that refuge is open to hunting only if hunting is compatible with the reason that the refuge was created in the first place. So there has to be some kind of reason or justification for why they're opening this up. Yes, and so you know, the primary purpose of all wildlife refuges obviously

is for wildlife conservation. You know, if hunting doesn't conflict with that, or if the Secretary decides that it doesn't conflict with that for whatever reason, then they can open into hunting. So it sounds like basically wildlife refuges are off limits for hunting except for when the Secretary of the Interior decides otherwise, and the Secretary can do that as he or she sees fit with a good reason. Yes, So what exactly is the Ficial Wildlife Service proposing here?

I mean, two point three million acre sounds like a lot, but is it? It It is a lot. So there are five hundred plus National Wildlife refuges all throughout the country, and most of these refugeses are pretty are pretty small. I went hiking on a National Wildlife refuge just out outside of d C last weekend, and you know, it's a few hundred acres and it was created to you know, preserve bald eagle habitat. And so that's a really good example.

I actually don't know if that one's open to hunting or not, but they're not going to let let anybody go in there to hunt bald eagles. They're going to let people go in there to hunt for you know, you know, some other migratory bird that that isn't threatened well speak speaking of that, you know, under this plan that came out last week, what would people actually be able to hunt in these refuges. I mean, I guess it depends on the area, but so it includes migratory birds,

it includes big game. So there's a refuge in Florida just outside Actually it's the newest wildlife refuge in the country Everglades Headwaters National Wildlife Refuge that's going to be open to both migratory bird hunting and big came hunting for the first time. And so you could go and hunt deer there potentially at a wildlife refuge. But I

mean there are some places that are still closed. I mean there's a large refuge in New Mexico called Sevietta, which is pretty big, but you know, like little tenC tiny little postage stamps of this massive refuge are open

to hunting. So there, you know, it really varies. Okay, we're going to take a quick break now, but when we come back, we're going to talk about why the Fish and Wildlife Service is proposing this right now spoiler alert has to do with the coronavirus and also what the President's sun may have to do with all of this. Stay tuned. All right, we are back with Bobby McGill and we're talking about the Fish and Wildlife Services post

coronavirus plan to open up wildlife refuges for hunting. So you did some great reporting on this, and one quote that you had in here I think just really stood out for me. Really a skip with the head of the Fish and Wildlife Service said that when the coronavirus has been defeated, quote, there will be no better way to celebrate than to get out and enjoy increased access

for hunting and fishing on our public lands. So it sounds like the reason why the Fish and Wildlife Service is doing this is maybe solely to reward people who've been quarantined and allow them to sort of go out and, you know, celebrate the end of the virus. Is that it or are there? Is it actually more complicated than that? I think it's more complicated than that just on its face. You know a lot of people are tired of being inside and they're thinking about being outside. And I will

say I am one of those people. Yeah, well so am I? And and it's it's true, like I want to go to national parks and wildlife refuges too, but you know, we have restrictions now. But this follows a little bit of a pattern here. One is that a few weeks ago Bernhardt, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, that's a I should say, we should say, that's a really a

skip with spots. Yeah, so skip with this. The director of the of the Fish and Wildlife Service and which is a sub agency of Interior, and so Interior Secretary Bernhard a few weeks ago announced the national parks were going to stay open so that people could socially distance outside in the parks. And what happened was that a lot of those individual parks, I'd say most of most national parks right now are closed or at least to some degree closed because the crowds were too big. Oh yeah,

that's not what you want right now. But some of them remain open. And you know this this sort of follows, you know, this pattern of the administration sort of declaring that, you know, federal lands are available to the public to be used by the public, and you know, the pandemic

shouldn't fully stand in the way of that. This this sort of speaks to that sentiment the other thing is that this also follows a pattern of the administration sort of declaring that federal lands should be open to use rather than conservation, and it sort of emphasizes, you know, this idea that and they've said this in previous documents, you know, with under you know from other Interior agencies, that federal lands are sources of they provide goods and services. Yeah,

and that's when you say there's a pattern there. That's definitely something that I've noticed on the many times you've joined us on this podcast. It seems like that's a theme that the Interior Department really wants public lands and federal lands to be used. So all right, you know, I guess come this fall, federal lands will be more open to hunting. Let's talk about the impact on the environment. What are some environmental issues to increased access to hunting.

So there's several concerns here. One is, and just to be clear, this is this applies only to the twenty one hunting season, so you know, this may not apply after that. The other we don't know yet. The other thing is that environmental groups are concerned that increased hunting. And also to clarify, you know, some of some of these refuges are are being they're seeing expanded hunting. So they may have already been open to hunting, but now more species and there will be able to be hunted.

And but environmental groups worry that, you know, because some of these wildlife refuges protecting dangered species or other threatened species, that some of these species might be killed accidentally. It's not like, you know, there's going to be a ranger looking over the shoulder of every hunter that's in a refuge, and so they fear that this could result in accidental killings. Yeah, and these are you know, potentially endangered species or maybe

threatened species that could be impacted here. Absolutely. I mean, think about the refuge I mentioned a few minutes ago that was designed that was created to protect bald eagles. I mean, it's conceivable that someone going to a refuge like that could accidentally kill a bald eagle, you know, in that case is protected, but it could be something else. It could be a you know, a smaller bird that's

that's endangered. And it just depends. It increases the risk, they say, And finally, before we let you go, Bobby, this is kind of a tangential issue but there's a connection here to this story with the President's son, Donald Trump Junior. Can you explain that a little bit? What

does he have to do with all of this? So when the Interior Department, in the Fish and Wildlife Service announced this expanded hunting in refuges, they sent out a press release that included a number of statements from well from hunting advocacy groups, and one of them was Safari Club International, which you know very strongly endorsed this move, and Safari Club International is connected with Donald Trump Junior.

They held they auctioned off a dream hunt in Alaska, which would have been you know, seven days in the Tongus National Forest to go you know, hunting, and and you know they've he's also been a keynote speaker at some at one of their conferences, and there's a connection there.

The Fish and Wildlife Service would not respond to my questions about, you know, whether or not there was any additional connection there, whether they were trying to curry favor or whether there or whether there was pressure from Donald Trump Junior to open up these refuges. I don't know, and uh, but they wouldn't respond to questions. All right, Well, that I'll do it for today's episode of Parts Pervilion.

If you want more on the coronavirus pandemic and its effects on the environment, check out our website Newstop Bloomberg Environment dot com. That website once again is newsdop Bloomberg Environment dot Com. Today's episode of Parts Pavilion was produced by myself along with Josh Block and Marissa Horn. Pars Pavilion was created by Jessica Coombs and Rachel Daegel. The music for today's episode is a Message by Jizarre and tally Hoe by Dick Walter. They were used under a

Creative Comments license. Thanks for listening everyone. Hey there, I'm Kyle triggsda Politics editor for Bloomberg Government, and I'm Greg Giroux, Senior Elections reporter for Bloomberg Government. Check out our podcast, down Ballot Counts. Each week, Greg and I will be breaking down all of those down ballot elections that make up the fight for the US Congress. Listen the Subscribe to Downballot Counts from Bloomberg Government wherever you get your podcasts.