VICTORY LAP BY NICOLE RIVARD AND FRAN SILVERMAN
FOA SUES DOI TO RELEASE NAMES OF U.S. TROPHY HUNTERS AND IMPORTERS
Similarly, African giraffes are also in danger of being wiped out, with just 97,500 remaining in Africa, a drop from 150,000 in 1985. In 2016, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) The key federal agency that oversees elevated the threat level of giraffes the imports of elephants, giraffes, two categories to “vulnerable to lions and other hunted threatened extinction.” Giraffes are already and vulnerable species is refusing to gone from seven countries in Africa, release the names of U.S. residents Burkina Faso, Eritrea, Guinea, who are receiving the trophies and Malawi, Mauritania, Nigeria and body parts, a violation of the Freedom Senegal. Yet giraffes currently have no of Information Act (FOIA), FoA’s protection under U.S. law. And Wildlife Law Program said in filings. Earlier this year, FoA filed FOIA like with elephants, the U.S. is a requests with the federal Department major importer of giraffe parts and of the Interior seeking information derivatives. Between 2006 and on the numbers of elephant skins 2016, the U.S. imported 21,402 and giraffe parts being imported into bone carvings, 3,008 skin pieces the U.S., including the names of the and 3, 744 hunting trophies. Who is getting these parts, however, remains importers. Just 350,000 elephants remain under wraps because the federal in Africa. Yet, despite the dwindling Department of the Interior (DOI) is population of African elephants, withholding the names of hundreds which are listed as threatened under of the importers. FoA appealed the withholding the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the U.S. is a major importer of elephant of the names and filed a lawsuit in parts and products, exceeding other federal court against DOI when countries. In 2016, the U.S. imported the agency didn’t answer FoA’s 2,079 whole African elephant skins, appeal in the proper time frame. FoA is also supporting efforts by up from 275 two years before. In an effort to protect African animal protection groups that have elephants, FoA has petitioned the requested that FWS list extend ESA U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) protections to giraffes. In 2018, an FoA investigation to amend the ESA to include greater restrictions on the trade of elephant that included a FOIA request into skins and other body parts and it U.S. trophy hunters revealed that has sought data on the numbers and more than half the hunters who kinds of skin imports coming into the received permits to bring back lion parts from Africa donated to the U.S.
4 | Friends of Animals
Republicans or were connected to Safari Club International. Included in the list of hunters who received permits was Indiana resident Steven Chancellor, who raised more than $1 million for Republican candidates at a fundraiser at this home in 2016 headlined by Donald Trump. Once he became President, Trump’s administration eased restrictions on U.S. trophy hunters. An earlier investigation by FoA also found that FWS had quietly issued 16 individual permits authorizing the import of sport-hunted elephant trophies from Zimbabwe before announcing to the public in November that it was lifting its ban on hunting of elephants in that country. “Transparency is critical to our ability to protect these endangered animals and to our democracy. The public deserves to know if the government is granting permits based on scientific information or if improper political influences may be at play,’’ said Jennifer Best, assistant director of FoA’s Wildlife Law Program. “There is no justification for withholding this information.” The Supreme Court has stated that FOIA establishes a strong presumption in favor of disclosure, and Congress has affirmed these tenants, WLP noted in its appeals. The guiding principal of FOIA is the public’s fundamental right to know. The law favors disclosure, not secrecy.
