Sponsors (10)
The bill would reduce immediate and long‑term cyanide poisoning risks to people, pets, and wildlife by restricting and removing M‑44 devices, but it shifts costs and operational burdens onto ranchers, state/local agencies, and taxpayers and could complicate predator‑management strategies.
Children, people recreating or working on public lands, family pets, and nearby communities will face substantially lower risk of accidental cyanide poisoning because M‑44 devices would be restricted and existing devices removed.
Near-term exposure risk will fall quickly because federal, state, and county agencies must locate and remove existing M‑44 devices within 30 days, providing an immediate reduction in danger to people, pets, and wildlife.
Endangered and nontarget wildlife would likely suffer fewer fatalities and collateral harms if M‑44 deployment is limited or banned in sensitive areas.
Ranchers and livestock owners will likely face higher predator‑control costs and may need to adopt more expensive or labor‑intensive alternatives if M‑44s are restricted or removed.
State and county agencies, and ultimately taxpayers, will incur operational, labor, monitoring, and enforcement costs to locate and remove devices and to implement replacement predator‑control programs, straining local budgets.
Wildlife management programs lose a targeted tool for predator control, which could increase human–wildlife conflicts, livestock losses, or pressure on alternative management methods.
Based on analysis of 3 sections of legislative text.
Bans placement and use of M–44 sodium cyanide ejector devices on specified federal public lands and requires removal within 30 days.
Introduced June 26, 2025 by Jeff Merkley · Last progress June 26, 2025
Prohibits the placement, preparation, setting, deployment, or use of M–44 sodium cyanide ejector devices on federal public lands and requires Federal, State, or county agencies to remove any such devices from those lands within 30 days of enactment. The text defines M–44 devices and lists the federal land management agencies whose lands are covered. The bill also records findings that sodium cyanide used in M–44s is a highly toxic pesticide, that M–44s have caused accidental human exposures, injuries to pets and nontarget wildlife (including endangered species), and that the devices are not fully effective at only killing intended targets about 53% of the time.