Safari Club International (SCI) voiced its strong opposition to the recently announced Bears Ears National Monument Resource Management Plan. In promulgating this proposal, the Biden-Harris administration’s Department of the Interior and Department of Agriculture have exceeded their regulatory authorities by closing off these public lands to responsible recreational activities, thereby threatening vital conservation funding. The plan also imposes severe restrictions on vehicle access and establishes a total ban on recreational shooting on the entirety of Bears Ears National Monument’s (BENM) 1.3 million acres, a move that will have substantial economic and conservation consequences.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) fails to justify why the Biden-Harris administration has elected to close all recreational shooting access in direct contravention of the John D. Dingell, Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act. The Dingell Act explicitly mandates that public access closures for recreational activities, such as shooting, must be demonstrably in pursuit of a quantifiable objective that affects the smallest possible area for the shortest period necessary. This proposed plan would end open access for recreational shooting in favor of total closure with no explanation, in blatant violation of the Dingell Act’s clear language.
Moreover, the Pittman-Robertson Act directs excise taxes from the sale of firearms, ammunition, and related gear to fund critical wildlife conservation efforts.
By restricting recreational shooting, the proposed plan discourages purchases of these products, diminishing the tax revenues essential to wildlife management and conservation programs. The result is fewer funds available for the very conservation goals the plan claims to advance.
While the plan technically allows for hunting on BENM, the Biden-Harris administration is severely limiting motorized vehicle access in remote areas, a decision that will disproportionately impact older and less mobile hunters who rely on off road vehicles to reach hunting grounds. This added burden will reduce the number of trips hunters and outfitters can take each year, hurting local economies and limiting access to public lands.
SCI calls on the Departments of the Interior and Agriculture to reconsider this major federal overreach in both scope and effect. The responsible use of public lands for activities like recreational shooting and hunting is essential to funding conservation, maintaining traditional activities, and ensuring access for all Americans.
“The Bears Ears plan is a misguided affront to sportsmen and women, the greatest stewards of our public lands,” said SCI Executive Vice President for International Government and Public Affairs Ben Cassidy. “The total ban on recreational shooting is unwarranted, unsupported, and will only drain the very resources that support wildlife conservation projects. This is a case of federal overreach, plain and simple.”
“This policy doesn’t just hurt sportsmen and women—it undermines the entire ecosystem of conservation funding,” said SCI CEO W. Laird Hamberlin. “By shutting down recreational shooting, the plan takes a sledgehammer to a critical funding source for conservation projects and disregards the public’s right to access the lands they help sustain. SCI is proud to oppose this proposed resource management plan as part of our longstanding mission to be First for Hunters.”
