Alaska hunters win again in Ninth Circuit ruling

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Even the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals was not willing to take away the rights of Alaskans to manage wildlife through predator control in the 16 wildlife refuges in the state. On Monday, the judges decided against the radical environmentalists, and for the hunters.

The case had been brought by the Center for Biological Diversity. It challenged the Congressional Review Act that gave Congress a way to review and disapprove regulations made during the waning days of the Obama Administration.

One of those regulations that was rescinded was a rule that prevented Alaska from applying certain state hunting regulations and game management practices on federal wildlife refuges.

The Center for Biological Diversity sought to force the Department of Interior to reinstate the rule against Alaska. The lower court had dismissed the lawsuit, and the CBD appealed it to the Ninth Circuit, which is the most liberal appeals court in the nation.

But a panel from the Ninth Circuit found invalid the Center’s arguments that Congress violated a constitutional balance of power.

Read the ruling here:

“Because Congress properly enacted the joint resolution, and therefore validly amended Interior’s authority to administer national wildlife refuges in Alaska, Congress did not prevent the president from exercising his constitutional duty to faithfully execute the laws,” U.S. Circuit Judge Sandra Segal Ikuta wrote. “Indeed, the president now has the constitutional obligation to execute the joint resolution.

“Congress’s efforts to exercise oversight of federal administrative agencies by means of the CRA are consistent with the ‘structure of this government, and the distribution of this mass of power among its constituent parts,’” she wrote on behalf of three judges.

The rule that was rolled back pertained to predator control. The Center for Biological Diversity characterize it as using bait to kill grizzly bears or killing wolf pups in their dens. Indeed, Alaska state game managers do use predator control to ensure healthy populations across the board. There are an estimated 53,500 grizzly bears in Alaska, or about one bear for every seven humans.

When President Barack Obama took over wildlife management of federal wildlife refuges, his regulations created a patchwork of management practices for wildlife — animals that moved freely between those state and federal jurisdictions.

In 2017, the Republicans in Congress overturned those federal rules. The Center for Biological Diversity was challenging the right of Congress to overturn those 11th hour regulations that occurred under Obama. The Center will likely not appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court, since they have lost in the most liberal court in the land.

5 COMMENTS

  1. It’s good to see that with the recent appointments to the 9th that it is starting to understand how laws work as opposed to before when the liberals had the 9th on lock down and they tried to write or rewrite laws to fit their agenda.

  2. President Trump has done a terrific job with appoint new judges to the ninth circuit and with another few this year things may turn around on that court….and it may once again become something close to a court of law….

  3. George Bush appointed Judge Sandra Segal Ikuta and Senior Judge N Randy Smith.
    Bill Clinton appointed Senior Judge Richard Charles Tallman.

    These three judges served on the panel that issued this reasonable opinion.
    None of the ten newly confirmed Trump appointments served on the panel.

    When considering all the 9th Circuit Court judges and senior judges, the Democrat heritage judges still have a one judge majority. Therefore the three judge panel is nearly equally likely to be 2-1 or 1-2 and unlikely to be 0-3. In fact the probability of 3 Obama, Clinton or Carter judges is less than 13%. Similarly the probability of 3 Trump, Bush, Bush, Reagan or Nixon judges is less than 12%.

    In addition to 29 Circuit Judges, the Ninth Circuit Court has 20 Senior Circuit Court Judges.

  4. Why don’t any of the people who want to impose these new restrictions go out and interview local residents. Ask questions and see what the real people are dealing with. There is an overabundance of wolves on POW island and it effectively wiping out the deer population. And when Obama was president, they sent people in to study and their conclusion was we have a shortage of them, put them on the endangered list. Well that was a big joke to all the island residents. Because they know their science was bogus. One wolf eats 70 sitka deer. Do the math, there are an estimated 1,000 wolves here as best the reliable residents can figure. So it won’t take long to decimate the deer. Get the picture. Very, very sad.

  5. Glad to see this 9th Circuit Court decision. How long till ADF&G can get started reopening the Kenai Wildlife Refuge to the Grizzly Bear Hunt it had in spring of 2014? And get the spring Black Bear hunt back to what it used to be on those Federally managed lands.

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