• Captive Hunts
  • Poaching
  • Contest Kills
  • Pheasant Stocking
  • Bear Hunting
HSUS >> Wildlife Abuse >> Campaigns >> USSA

Extremists in Camouflage: The U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance

 
 

©Satchell/The HSUS

  The USSA supports many extremist positions on hunting, such as canned hunts.
The United States Sportsmen's Alliance (USSA) has a continuing campaign to denigrate the reputation and work of The Humane Society of the United States. The HSUS believes you should know more about the work and orientation of the USSA.

A Hunting Industry Trade Group

The USSA receives the largest share of its money from one foundation, and it does not receive substantial support for its work from individual citizens or its relatively small membership. It also receives money from archery, firearms and ammunitions makers and the makers of other forms of hunting equipment. In short, the organization is a hunting industry trade group that falsely presents itself as a widely supported membership organization.

Out of Step with Mainstream Americans

The USSA has a history of adopting extreme positions on hunting and trapping issues. The HSUS is not aware of a single instance in which the USSA supported a limitation on inhumane or unsportsmanlike hunting activities. It consistently supports an expansion of hunting and trapping opportunities, even when the activities are inimical to the principles of conservation, animal welfare or "fair chase," and even when the practices are opposed by rank-and-file hunters and sportsmen.

  • The USSA supports the trophy hunting of threatened and endangered species. It is an intervenor in a lawsuit in a U.S. District Court that would limit the imports of sport-hunted trophies from argali sheep, one of the world's rarest bighorn sheep. The USSA opposed efforts to stop the hunting of grizzly bears in the contiguous 48 states, even though the populations are classed as "threatened" with extinction in that portion of their range. The USSA supports efforts to allow for the import of sport-hunted cheetah trophies, knowing that these animals are listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act. It also supports the trophy hunting of a wide range of other rare and threatened species.

  • The USSA has supported amending the Marine Mammal Protection Act to provide for the import of sport-hunted polar bear trophies from Canada. Even with polar bear populations in jeopardy from climate change and recently listed as threatened with extinction under the ESA, USSA maintains its position that American hunters should shoot them in the Arctic.

  • The USSA fiercely opposes federal legislation to halt the shooting of tame, exotic animals in fenced enclosures. This practice is known as canned hunting, and the practice is reviled by responsible hunters throughout the United States.

  • The USSA has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars opposing efforts to limit bear baiting, a practice in which a hunter sets out food and shoots a bear while he or she is feeding at the bait site.

  • The USSA has opposed the creation of any new national parks that restrict hunting, even though national parks—from Yellowstone to Yosemite to the Everglades—have long restricted the hunting of wildlife, both for the benefit of wildlife and the public safety of visitors.

  • The Ohio-based USSA has led the charge to open sport hunting seasons on mourning doves in several Midwestern states that have long traditions of protecting these gentle and inoffensive birds. Legislators and voters in pro-hunting states such as Iowa and Michigan have repeatedly rejected the USSA's underhanded efforts.

The HSUS has worked to pass a series of ballot initiatives to restrict particularly inhumane and unsportsmanlike hunting practices, such as the use of steel-jawed leghold traps, bear baiting, hound hunting of predators, and the shooting of mourning doves in states where they had long been protected. In two-thirds of these statewide elections, voters have approved ballot initiatives to curtail inhumane hunting and trapping practices, illustrating that the views of the USSA are out of step with mainstream voters.

In short, USSA represents a fringe segment of the hunting industry and is out of step with rank-and-file hunters and mainstream Americans who find certain practices to be inhumane, abusive and unacceptable.



Printer Friendly

Related Links

Safari Club International