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Protect Polar Bears

Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Posted in News | Tagged News

Polar bears are in danger of extinction from global warming. We must take immediate action to curb the climate crisis.

One of George W. Bush’s 11th-hour decisions was a special rule that weakened protections for the polar bear by exempting greenhouse gas emissions — the number-one threat to the bear — or any other threat generated outside the Arctic from regulation under the Endangered Species Act.

Congress, however, passed special legislation granting President Barack Obama’s Interior Secretary, Ken Salazar, 60 days to revoke the damaging Bush regulations with the stroke of a pen. Secretary Salazar’s deadline is this Friday, May 9.

On April 28, Salazar announced that he will use this authority to revoke one of Bush’s regulations that gutted the Endangered Species Act. But he has not yet said whether he will rescind the special rule that eliminates critical protections for the polar bear. The clock is ticking for polar bears — Secretary Salazar only has 5 days left until his authority expires.

In the past week alone, Secretary Salazar has received letters from over 1,300 scientists, 41 members of Congress, and 35 members of the California legislature asking him to revoke the polar bear rule.

Please join these lawmakers and scientists in this urgent fight to protect polar bears. Sign the petition, click the share button on the petition page to post to your other networks, and forward this email to a friend today.

With your help, we can convince Interior Secretary Salazar to revoke Bush’s special polar bear extinction regulation before the May 9 deadline.

If you have trouble following the link, go to http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/2167/t/8257/petition.jsp?petition_KEY=1878