petition: https://www.addup.org/campaigns/tell-congress-to-protect-the-arctic-national-wildlife-refuge
No place is more worthy of protection than the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In the summer of 2015, I had the incredible opportunity to travel to this unique place, and I discovered there a kind of comfort, tranquility, and peace I’ve experienced in few other places. Of course, Americans have always loved our open lands. Our spirit as a people is as vast as our wild places. The Arctic refuge is the epitome of that spirit—rugged, unapologetic, and indescribably vast.
Unbelievably, this Congress is advancing a plan that would destroy the wild character of the Arctic refuge. The tax bill currently before Congress includes a provision that would open the refuge’s coastal plain to oil and gas exploration and drilling. Drilling in the refuge would feed our fossil fuel addiction and could lead to contaminated waters, reduced wildlife, and oil spills that would destroy the Arctic tundra. Putting oil wells in such a place is appalling and un-American. That’s why I’m fighting to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
There’s no time to lose, because the truth is that we’re already losing the Arctic. Climate disruption is happening there five times faster than anywhere else in the world. We simply can’t afford speeding up this destruction with more oil and gas drilling. Make no mistake: This is a contest of values. The Arctic represents the ideal of wilderness and the American spirit. Saying “no” to drilling is a way of saying “yes” to preserving some places wild and free.
It’s also a matter of human rights. The Gwich’in, an Alaska Native group, depend on the caribou herds that roam throughout the refuge. For the Gwich’in, the coastal plain is sacred land. If we permit the destruction of this land, it would mark a victory for corporate greed and political corruption. That’s the antithesis of why I serve in the U.S. military—to protect and defend our land and our people.
https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/arctic-refuge-too-valuable-drill
https://www.sierraclub.org/press-releases/2017/12/murkowski-republican-leadership-wrong-arctic-drilling
“One of the only ways they could make this horrible bill worse, and even more unpopular, is by adding in a plan to drill in the Arctic Refuge.Murkowski and Republican Leadership have it wrong here. Drilling is not what the American people want. Drilling is not what the Gwich’in Nation deserves. Drilling is not what the future should hold for one of our country’s last great wild places. Congress must vote down this rigged tax scheme.”
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