How Western State Hunting Could End by Labor Day
By Rob Shaul
It's April 15, 2021 and current US Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack, suffers a stroke and is forced to resign.
In his place, President Biden nominates former Interior Secretary under Obama, Sally Jewell. Prior to serving in the Obama administration, Jewell had been the CEO of REI.
Two weeks later Jewell is confirmed on a party-line vote in the US Senate, with Vice President Kamala Harris casting the deciding vote.
Under Obama and while Interior Secretary, Jewel issued a rule prohibiting predator control on 16 federally owned refuges in Alaska. "That prohibition included a ban on the aerial hunting, live trapping or baiting of predators such as bears and wolves — as well as on killing those predators while near their dens or their cubs."
Western states, led by Alaska, protested the rule as federal overreach into state management of wildlife, but were powerless to make any quick change. It wasn't until 2017, after Trump was elected and Republicans controlled both the Senate and the House, that Congress passed a narrow law reversing the Obama-era rule.
On May 15, 2021, one of Jewell's former employees at REI sends the new Secretary of Agriculture a link to the "Greatest Hits" compilation of extreme range hunting kill shots published by the Cody, Wyoming TV Show, "Best of the West."
Just before a kill shot on the Best of the West “Greatest Hits” YouTube video.
The 4 minute, 26-second YouTube video shows 66, mostly extreme-distance, kill shots on bears, sheep, elk, deer, mountain goats, moose, antelope, wolfs, exotics and bison - one kill shot every 4 seconds.
Included are kill shots over 1,000 yards, multiple head shots, kill shots on exotic animals trapped in a high fence ranch, a kill shot on a zebra, two kill shots on wolves, and a close-up kill shot on a black bear out of a tree.
Jewell, disgusted by this video, goes to the Best of the West website and sees that the Wild Sheep Foundation is a show sponsor, as is Hornady Ammunition.
Jewell calls Gray Thornton, President and CEO of the Wild Sheep Foundation to ask him about the video and the Foundation's sponsorship of the Best of the West. Thornton defends the Foundation and in responding to Jewell's concerns about Fair Chase and graphic killing, replies "that's part of hunting."
Next, Jewell goes to the Hornady website and sees that Hornady is a strong financial supporter of the NRA.
Seeing a political opportunity, Jewell reaches out to the Secretary of the Interior, Deb Haaland. Haaland agrees that something needs to be done.
Jewell and Haaland approach President Biden, who upon seeing the Best of the West video, is similarly disgusted. He also sees the opportunity to score an easy political victory over the NRA.
Biden directs his staff to draft up an executive order and at a press conference on June 15, 2021, signs the order which announces an 18-month moratorium on all hunting on federal lands, including U.S. Forest Service and BLM lands nationwide.
Biden announces a new hunting Taskforce which will study hunting methods, hunting's impact on wildlife and resources, and the appropriateness of hunting in modern society. The taskforce includes representatives from environmental groups, anti-hunting groups, vegans, minority Congressmen and women representing urban areas, and a few hunting group representatives. The Taskforce is directed to bring the President recommendations concerning continued hunting on federal lands at the end of 12 months, with the goal of implementing the changes at the end of the 18-month moratorium.
Biden signs an executive order as Harris observes.
The congressional delegations and governors from Alaska, Wyoming, Montana, Utah, Idaho, New Mexico, Nevada, and Colorado protest the executive order claiming federal overreach into state game management and announce a joint lawsuit, but the order will remain in place until the lawsuit can grind through the federal courts.
Hunting is still allowed on state and private lands, but because so much western state hunting occurs on US Forest Service and BLM lands, Biden's executive order effectively ends hunting in the western US for at least two seasons.
Midwest and Eastern states are little affected by Biden's executive order, as most of the hunting in these states occurs on state or private lands, and western-state senators and representatives can find few allies in other senators and congressmen from these regions.
CNN, MSNBC, the New York Times and other media find the worse hunting blood and guts porn on the internet and hammer home the issue for a 36-hour news cycle. Even Fox Network’s most partisan evening hosts cannot defend the Best of the West video and mostly avoid the issue.
Multiple hunting industry companies and organizations including Sitka Gear, Meateater, Bass Pro Shops, Kuiu, Winchester, Remington, Vortex, Ruger, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Mule Deer Foundation, and Backcountry Hunters and Anglers initially defend long range hunting, kill shots and trophy pictures, but soon admit changes are needed as sales and donations plummet.
In the end, only Hornady, the firearms industry, and the NRA, continue to defend the video.
Polls taken on July 1, 2021, two weeks after Biden's executive order, show that feelings about hunting by non hunters in the US have dropped from 87% acceptibility in 2017, to just 20% post-executive order.
In August, Biden announces he won't run for a second term and immediately endorses Vice President Kamala Harris for the 2024 Democratic Nomination.
In her Presidential bid announcement on Labor Day, September 1, 2021, Harris declares that if elected, she'll make Biden's hunting moratorium on federal land permanent.
Most of this is hypothetical ..... but it demonstrates how vulnerable big game hunting in the Western States is to quick, political change. But … already the Biden Administration has proposed a rule which will restrict caribou and moose hunting in two hunting units in Alaska.
Kill shots and hunting gore = political suicide for the future of hunting in the western US.