WASHINGTON - A federal judge today said the Bush administration erred when they did not conduct a full environmental review before determining that the polar bear could not be protected under the Endangered Species Act from the effects of heat-trapping pollution. While the judge said that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was within its discretion to not protect the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act from heat-trapping pollution, today Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) insisted that a proper environmental review using updated science should show that polar bears and other species are threatened by global warming.
"This shows that it is an unacceptable practice for the government to freeze out science and environmental review," said Rep. Markey, the top Democrat on the Natural Resources Committee. Rep. Markey chaired a hearing on the polar bear and global warming in 2008. "The best available science already shows us that pollution from coal, oil and other fossil fuels is altering the climate. A proper scientific assessment will show this pollution threatens the survival of polar bears and other species, including the real and dangerous impacts on the most important species of all: humans."
U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan of the District of Columbia also said that sport-hunted polar bear trophies could not be imported into the United States because of the reduction in the species.
"Whether it's a bullet from the barrel of a gun or pollution from a smokestack, polar bears have been under attack for too long," said Rep. Markey.
