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Native Tule elk, numbering only in the low hundreds at Point Reyes National Seashore and the low thousands in California, are otherwise extinct across their historic range, with only about 6000 left in the entire world, and only in California. Shockingly, at Point Reyes National Seashore, Tule elk are being killed by a horrible, intentional design of the National Park Service, with the blessing of California Congressman Jared Huffman, only to enrich for-profit ranchers. We must send a strong message to Rep. Huffman urging him to do the right thing: stop killing Tule elk at Point Reyes, and get private cattle businesses out — or face an outraged public and an informed, angry electorate.

Rep. Huffman was an environmental lawyer, so he knows full well that National Park Service (NPS) policies kill hundreds of wild Tule elk at Point Reyes National Seashore. Yet he vocally supports these deadly policies anyway — because doing so pleases private ranching operations. And these cattlemen already receive fat federal subsidies while their thousands of exploited cows pollute and degrade this unique national seaside park.

Adding lethal insult to ongoing elk injury, Rep. Huffman also promoted the NPS' newly enacted policy which even allows some elk outside the fenced “Reserve” to be shot, a brutal population control method that ranchers also successfully lobbied Rep. Huffman and Capital Hill for. All these cruel, unnecessary, and anti-wildlife policies contradict the mission and purpose of this (or any) national park.

The simple fact is that Tule elk will continue to suffer and die at Point Reyes until all elk and cattle fencing is removed, along with the cattle operations. The fewer than 300 surviving elk inside the Reserve can't roam freely to find year-round food and water and expand their dwindling population otherwise.

In short, Point Reyes National Seashore has been given over to large-scale cattle businesses that sell the mythology that they are small and struggling. Misleading and misinforming the public means their environmental, ethical, and legal offenses can be justified, excused, or simply ignored.

Letter to Decision Maker(s) for reference:

Subject: Congressman Huffman: Don’t Shoot Tule Elk — Free Them!

I am strongly protective of wild animals, especially those living with the additional protections afforded wild animals living within our national parks system. I am deeply troubled by the abuse of national parklands by private, for-profit businesses. And I am one of over 250,000 In Defense of Animals supporters. 

As such, I’m writing to urge you to reverse your position of support for the newly enacted General Management Plan policies at Point Reyes National Seashore which confine the Tule elk within its so-called, “Tule Elk Reserve," and now allows the lethal shooting of Tule elk in areas outside the Reserve.

Additionally, I urge you to reverse your vocal support for private cattle operators at the Seashore, and instead become a vocal advocate for full protections and expansion of the Tule elk herds, without artificial constraints, fencing, limitations on its population, or “management” or “control” of any kind. All such controls are artificial, cruel, and also unnecessary.

This is a national park unit where Tule elk and all its wildlife should be free of both fences and human-imposed population controls. These artificial constraints exist only to serve the financial interests of beef and dairy operations which pollute the Seashore's land and waterways, the Pacific Ocean, and even the atmosphere of this national treasure, and beyond.  

Your current stance is in flagrant defiance of the will of your California constituents as well as the majority of the visiting national public. Tule elk are a major tourist attraction at Point Reyes and a revenue stream for local businesses. Cows are not, since they are plentiful in surrounding Marin and Sonoma Counties.

We all already feel the effects of the climate crisis — which you yourself speak out about in other policy initiatives — so it is completely unacceptable and vexing to hear you contradict your own beliefs and admirable scientific positions, only to serve the cattle industry. I beg you to reconsider your political calculus and muster the political courage to do the right thing, for your constituents, for the Seashore, for California, for the country, and for the planet. You are capable of so much more, Mr. Congressman, and we deserve no less.

Thank you for your consideration in this urgent, critically important matter.

Sincerely,

Signed

This alert is no longer active, but here for reference. Animals still need your help.