United States S 877: Shark Fin Sales Elimination Act of 2019

Bill Text

II
116TH CONGRESS
1ST SESSION S. 877
To prohibit sale of shark fins, and for other purposes.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
MARCH 26, 2019
Mr. BOOKER (for himself, Mrs. CAPITO, Ms. CANTWELL, Mr. PORTMAN, Mr.
WHITEHOUSE, Ms. MCSALLY, and Mr. SCHATZ) introduced the following
bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce,
Science, and Transportation
A BILL
To prohibit sale of shark fins, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Shark Fin Sales Elimi-4
nation Act of 2019’’. 5
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 6
Congress finds the following: 7
(1) Sharks are critically important species for 8
their economic, cultural, and ecosystem value. 9
(2) Many shark populations are in peril world-10
wide and are on the decline. 11
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(3) One of the greatest threats to sharks is the 1
global trade in shark fins. It is estimated that fins 2
from as many as 73,000,000 sharks end up in the 3
global shark fin trade every year. 4
(4) Shark fins have no medicinal or nutritional 5
value. 6
(5) The trade in shark fins is primarily focused 7
on large coastal and pelagic species that grow slowly, 8
mature late, and have low reproduction rates. 9
(6) Shark fins are often removed and retained 10
while the remainder of a shark is discarded due to 11
the high market value of shark fins relative to other 12
parts of a shark. 13
(7) Shark fins are removed primarily to be com-14
mercialized as a fungible commodity. 15
(8) Shark finning is the cruel practice in which 16
the fins of a shark are cut off on board a fishing 17
vessel at sea. The remainder of the animal is then 18
thrown back into the water to drown, starve, or die 19
a slow death. 20
(9) Although the United States has banned the 21
practice of shark finning aboard vessels in waters 22
controlled by the United States, there is no Federal 23
ban on the removal and sale of shark fins once the 24
fin is brought ashore. 25
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(10) Once a shark fin is detached from the 1
body, it becomes impossible to determine whether 2
the shark was legally caught or the fin lawfully re-3
moved. 4
(11) It is difficult to determine which species of 5
shark a fin was removed from, which is problematic 6
because some species are threatened with extinction. 7
(12) The States of Texas, Delaware, Hawaii, Il-8
linois, Massachusetts, Maryland, New York, Oregon, 9
Rhode Island, California, Nevada, and Washington 10
and American Samoa, Guam, and the North Mar-11
iana Islands have implemented bans on the sale of 12
shark fins. 13
(13) Shark fins possessed, transported, offered 14
for sale, sold, or purchased anywhere in the United 15
States are part of a large international market, hav-16
ing a substantial and direct effect on interstate com-17
merce. 18
(14) Abolition of the shark fin trade in the 19
United States will remove the United States from 20
the global shark fin market and will put the United 21
States in a stronger position to advocate internation-22
ally for abolishing the shark fin trade in other coun-23
tries. 24
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SEC. 3. PROHIBITION ON SALE OF SHARK FINS. 1
(a) PROHIBITION.—Except as provided in section 4, 2
no person shall possess, transport, offer for sale, sell, or 3
purchase shark fins or products containing shark fins. 4
(b) PENALTY.—A violation of subsection (a) shall be 5
treated as an act prohibited by section 307 of the Magnu-6
son-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act 7
(16 U.S.C. 1857) and shall be penalized pursuant to sec-8
tion 308(a) of that Act (16 U.S.C. 1858(a)), except that 9
the maximum civil penalty for each violation shall be 10
$100,000, or the fair market value of the shark fins in-11
volved, whichever is greater. 12
SEC. 4. EXCEPTIONS. 13
A person may possess a shark fin that was taken law-14
fully under a State, territorial, or Federal license or per-15
mit to take or land sharks, if the shark fin is separated 16
from the shark in a manner consistent with the license 17
or permit and is— 18
(1) destroyed or discarded upon separation; 19
(2) used for noncommercial subsistence pur-20
poses in accordance with State or territorial law; 21
(3) used solely for display or research purposes 22
by a museum, college, or university, or other person 23
under a State or Federal permit to conduct non-24
commercial scientific research; or 25
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