The opponents of fair bear hunting in Maine are taking outrageous liberties with their misleading campaign rhetoric. One of their constant refrains is that Question 1—which would ban the cruel and unsporting hounding, trapping, and baiting of bears in the last state to allow all three extreme methods—is largely funded by out-of-state groups, including The HSUS and HSLF. Never mind that those groups have tens of thousands of members who are Maine residents, and who want to rid their state of this terrible cruelty.
Alamy
Voters in Maine will decide the fate of bears next Tuesday.
But the biggest omission is that the opponents of the measure, themselves, are mostly financed by out of state cash. According to their most recent campaign finance reports, the opponents’ campaign has amassed a war chest of more than $2.3 million, and 53 percent of reported donations have come from outside Maine.
That includes more than $150,000 from the Ohio-based U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance, about $40,000 from the Virginia-based National Rifle Association, more than $60,000 from the Arizona-based Safari Club International, and $65,000 from the Washington, D.C.-based “Ballot Issues Coalition” made up of several national hunting organizations. It also includes $400,000 from one individual who lives in Vermont.
Maine is the only state to allow trapping of bears for sport, and it’s no surprise that trappers’ groups around the country are rallying to keep Maine as a virtual do-as-you-please zone, the one place where they can snare bears in wire nooses and allow them to suffer and struggle to free themselves for hours or even days. Trapping organizations have pumped more than $187,000 into the campaign—that includes donations from the Indiana-based National Trappers Association, and from individual trappers associations not only in Maine but also in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Vermont, and West Virginia.
And what are they doing with all that cash from trappers and other states? They’re footing the bill for state-sponsored scare tactics and fear-mongering. The TV ads run by the opponents focus on bear attacks in Florida, and all but tell voters that bears will overrun the streets of downtown Portland and eat your children if they can’t be hounded, baited, and trapped. It turns out even their own biologists, outdoor writers, and hunting organization leaders don’t believe this alarmist claptrap about bears.
Randy Cross is one of the state bear biologists who appears in a TV ad calling Question 1 a “serious threat to public safety.” But in an email released under court order last week, Cross admits, “I think your fear of bears is exaggerated and is not rational…Since there has not been an unprovoked bear attack in the history of white settlement in Maine, it is not a realistic threat.”
So much for logical consistency.
In a recent op-ed, George Smith, the former director of the Sportsmen’s Alliance of Maine, concedes that “you do not need to be scared of bears.” Smith, who ran the campaign to defeat a similar initiative a decade ago, conceded he resorted to these unethical tactics. “I will admit that scaring you about bears,” Smith said, “was an important part of our strategy in 2004, and remains a powerful issue for those opposing the referendum. If you see a bear in the woods, you are most likely to see its rear end as it flees. I have had quite a few encounters with bears in the woods and never had a problem.”
Hunting writer and Question 1 opponent John Holyoke made a similar claim in a recent column: “The more alarmist among them have suggested that bears will attack people, eat their babies and terrorize us all. That’s just hyperbole, and has no place in the upcoming debate.”
Exaggerated. Not rational. Hyperbole. It’s no wonder a Bangor Daily News editorial said the opponents’ claims are “low-quality arguments that don’t pass the straight-face test.” Maine voters should reject these false scare tactics, and say “Yes” to decency by voting “Yes” on Question 1. And the rest of us should remember the pitiful low to which defenders of these cruel practices have sunk in Maine.
Paid for with regulated funds by Mainers for Fair Bear Hunting. P.O. Box 15367, Portland, ME, 04112
