The mission of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is to work with others to conserve, protect, and enhance fish, wildlife, and plants and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people. The Service’s responsibilities include conserving migratory birds, preventing wildlife disease, combating invasive species, protecting and recovering threatened and endangered species, and promoting global wildlife conservation—all of which rely on enforcement of relevant criminal and civil laws, such as the Endangered Species Act, Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and Lacey Act. The Service is the lead federal agency for protecting wildlife and plant resources through the effective enforcement of federal laws, regulations, and international treaties.
Wildlife trafficking is a serious threat to conservation, national security, economic prosperity, global health, and community stability. The Service is committed to continuing efforts to address it through a whole-of-government approach coordinated by the Presidential Task Force on Wildlife Trafficking. As part of the Task Force, which the U.S. Department of the Interior co-chairs with the Departments of State and Justice, the Service works alongside 16 other agencies to strengthen enforcement, reduce demand, and build international cooperation to end wildlife trafficking.
The Service’s Office of Law Enforcement (OLE), working with other federal, state, tribal, and international law enforcement partners, plays a key role in disrupting and shutting down this lucrative and harmful illegal business. OLE’s investigative and enforcement activities are led by 215 special agents and 136 wildlife inspectors stationed domestically and around the globe. In the United States, OLE was responsible for inspecting 185,910 declared shipments, valued at more than $6.7 billion in legal commerce, at 17 ports of entry in 2024. In addition, OLE personnel are stationed as attachés at ten U.S. embassies and stations in countries that drive or enable the illegal wildlife trade. In fiscal year 2024, the work of OLE personnel contributed to more than 6,921 wildlife crime investigations and court-ordered restitution of $1.8 million in fines, $1.1 million in civil penalties, 62 years in prison, and 210 years of probation.
ESA: Protecting Wildlife for More Than Half a Century
The Endangered Species Act (ESA) requires the Service to list species as endangered or threatened regardless of which country the species lives in. Benefits to the species include prohibitions on certain activities, such as import, export, take, commercial activity, interstate commerce, and foreign commerce. By regulating these activities, the ESA ensures people under the jurisdiction of the United States do not contribute to the further decline of listed species. Although the ESA’s prohibitions regarding listed species apply only to people subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, the ESA can generate conservation benefits such as increased awareness of listed species, research efforts to address conservation needs, or funding for conservation of the species in its range countries. The ESA also provides limited financial assistance to develop and manage programs to conserve listed species in foreign countries, encourages conservation programs for such species, and allows for assistance for programs, such as personnel and training.
Except by regulation or permit issued for specific purposes consistent with the ESA, it is unlawful for any person subject to the jurisdiction of the United States to:
- Import into and export from the United States listed species.
- Take—which includes harassing, harming, pursuing, hunting, shooting, wounding, killing, trapping, capturing, collecting, or attempting to do any of these—of listed species within the United States, its territorial waters, or on the high seas.
- Possess, sell, deliver, carry, transport, or ship listed species taken in violation of the ESA.
- Sell or offer for sale in interstate or foreign commerce or deliver, receive, carry, transport, or ship listed species in interstate or foreign commerce in the course of commercial activity.
(Foreign Species and the Endangered Species Act: Frequently Asked Questions, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.)
CITES: Protecting Species from Unsustainable Trade
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) is a global treaty to ensure international trade in wild plants and animals is legal, traceable, and biologically sustainable. As issues of wildlife use grow ever more complex, CITES provides tools to effectively conserve the world’s diverse natural resources.
The United States is one of 185 parties to the Convention, which includes 184 member countries and the European Union, that have agreed to implement the treaty to help control global over-exploitation of wildlife and the conservation of species. CITES is administered through the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). A secretariat located in Geneva, Switzerland, oversees the implementation of the treaty and assists with communications between countries.
Cacti, iguanas, and parrots represent some of the 40,900 species—including roughly 6,610 species of animals and 34,310 species of plants—currently protected by CITES. Species for which trade is controlled are listed in one of three appendixes to CITES, each conferring a different level of regulation and requiring CITES permits or certificates.
Permits enable inspection officials at ports of export and import to quickly verify that CITES specimens are properly documented. They also facilitate the collection of species-specific trade data, which are used in the creation of annual reports. These data are used to determine trends in trade and ensure that trade in wildlife is sustainable. This trade monitoring has created a substantial body of information on the management and use of CITES species worldwide.
The Lacey Act: 100-Plus Years of Conservation Protection
More than 100 years ago, President William McKinley signed the Lacey Act, giving the United States its first far-reaching federal wildlife protection law and setting the stage for a century of progress in safeguarding wildlife resources.
Passage of the Lacey Act in 1900 was prompted by growing concern about interstate profiteering in illegally taken game. The passenger pigeon was already well on its way to being hunted into extinction, and populations of other bird species were also declining in a number of states. Drafted and pushed through Congress by conservation-minded Representative John Lacey of Iowa, the Act made it illegal to transport from one state or territory to another any wild animals or birds killed in violation of state or territorial law. It also banned the importation of injurious wildlife that threatened crop production and horticulture in this country.
In its original version, the Lacey Act focused on helping states protect their native game animals. Early prosecutions documented large-scale interstate trafficking in illegally taken wildlife. In 1901, for example, 48 men in Illinois were charged under the new law for illegally shipping more than 22,000 quail, grouse, and ducks into the state. In New York, enforcement officers recovered more than 40,000 illegally traded game birds from a cold storage facility in Brooklyn.
Congress amended the Lacey Act several times during its first century. In the 1930s and 1940s, lawmakers expanded the statute’s prohibitions to cover international trade, uphold federal and foreign wildlife laws, and ban the importation of animals shipped under inhumane conditions. Amendments in 1981 overhauled the Act, reworking many of its provisions and increasing the penalties for wildlife trafficking.
Today, the Lacey Act makes it unlawful to import, export, transport, sell, buy, or possess fish, wildlife, or plants taken, possessed, transported, or sold in violation of any federal, state, foreign, or Native American tribal law, treaty, or regulation.
A Case in Point
A 2023 case highlights these wildlife laws and parties that are involved when these cases are investigated and adjudicated. In January 2023, a federal judge in Amarillo, Texas, sentenced Richard Kazmaier to six months in prison, three years of post-release supervision, and a $5,000 fine. Kazmaier pleaded guilty to a Lacey Act felony for importing protected wildlife into the United States without declaring it or obtaining the required permits.
According to court documents, Kazmaier was an associate professor of biology at West Texas A&M University before resigning in October 2022. A federal grand jury issued an indictment in January 2022 charging Kazmaier with smuggling goods into the United States and two violations of the ESA. Kazmaier pleaded guilty to a superseding charge of violating the Lacey Act.
Kazmaier admitted that, between March 2013 and February 2020, he imported wildlife items from Bulgaria, Canada, China, the Czech Republic, Indonesia, Latvia, Norway, Russia, South Africa, Spain, the United Kingdom, and Uruguay into Texas without declaring them. Kazmaier admitted he purchased and imported approximately 358 wildlife items with a total market value of $14,423 from eBay and other online sales websites. He did not import any live animals and instead purchased mostly skulls, skeletons, and taxidermy mounts.
Kazmaier acknowledged importing 14 protected species without obtaining permits, including the Eurasian otter, lynx, caracal, vervet monkey, greater naked-tailed armadillo, and king bird-of-paradise.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Office of Law Enforcement in Redmond, Washington, conducted the investigation as part of Operation Global Reach. The operation focused on the trafficking of wildlife from Indonesia to the United States.
An Ongoing Commitment
The Service’s Office of Law Enforcement staff are committed to investigating wildlife crime and referring cases to prosecution, stopping the illegal wildlife trade, ensuring a sustainable legal trade, reducing demand for illegal products, and providing technical assistance and expertise to other nations in the fight against global wildlife trafficking. These efforts help recover endangered species, conserve migratory birds, preserve wildlife habitat, safeguard fisheries, prevent the introduction and spread of invasive species, and promote international wildlife conservation for the benefit of the American people and the global community.
