Sign Today: Urge your representative to vote against the Westerman NEPA Discussion Draft!

One of the worst anti-wildlife bills we’ve ever seen is headed for a vote in the House of Representatives.

Under Rep. Bruce Westerman’s National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) Discussion Draft, agencies would be allowed and sometimes even required to disregard new scientific research, which could lead to countless species being harmed. Projects could even ignore NEPA and bypass assessments that we use to avoid causing serious damage to wildlife and landscapes.

And now, your representative will cast a vote that could reshape decades of environmental protection laws.

Make sure they hear from you today: Sign a message to your representative urging them to vote AGAINST the Westerman NEPA Discussion Draft!

Message

Dear Representative {contact_data~lastName},

As your constituent, I write to urge you to oppose efforts to undermine the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”), and to vote against the Westerman Discussion Draft, which had a hearing in the House Natural Resources Committee last week. The legislation would gut this bedrock environmental law by weakening and avoiding scientific, environmental reviews and drastically limiting challenges to projects that harm wildlife.

This bill is anti-science, because it allows and sometimes even requires agencies to disregard new scientific research, and it allows many projects to avoid environmental assessments or to ignore NEPA entirely. Without the most recent scientific information, agencies could unwittingly harm countless species. Because of the biodiversity and climate change crises, now is precisely the time that we should be increasing efforts to protect wildlife, not ignoring threats to wilderness and ecosystems.

Further, the legislation drastically undercuts judicial review and stifles residents’ voices by limiting how an impacted community can challenge a project and completely barring review of exceptions to NEPA. The bill also stacks the deck for sponsors of a project by setting unfair standards and letting projects proceed even when there are errors or deficiencies in an environmental document. We need to protect NEPA, so that potential harms to wildlife are closely considered, not recklessly rubberstamp projects and shut the public out of the decision-making process.

For these reasons, I urge you to vote against the Westerman NEPA Discussion Draft and to oppose any other efforts to dismantle NEPA. This bill is not permitting reform; it is a demolition of bedrock environmental law.

Sincerely,
{user_data~First Name} {user_data~Last Name}

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