AUGUSTA, Maine — A nationwide sporting group linked to the archconservative rocker and activist Ted Nugent stated Thursday it could fund a lawsuit towards Maine’s Sunday searching ban.
An advocacy arm of the Kansas-based Hunter Nation stated Wednesday it could make a five-figure donation towards a lawsuit filed in an Augusta court docket final week. The group’s CEO, Luke Hilgemann, declined to provide a extra particular determine, saying authorized prices are exhausting to foretell.
The Sunday searching lawsuit is a milestone in Maine as the primary one to ask {that a} main state regulation be overturned due to a constitutional proper to meals handed by voters right here in 2021. Solely Maine and Massachusetts nonetheless ban searching on Sundays in a remaining instance of a spiritual “blue regulation” barring sure actions on church days that dates again to the 1800s.
Eroding the ban is a perennial subject within the Maine Legislature, with lawmakers contemplating roughly 35 makes an attempt within the final 45 years to take action. Nevertheless it has survived with most hunters in favor of it and most landowners — significantly these in southern Maine — typically opposed. The Legislature has been cautious as a result of searching right here largely depends on entry to non-public land.
The lawsuit was filed by a Readfield couple and arranged by the Maine Hunters United for Sunday Looking, a coalition led by Democratic lobbyist Jared Bornstein that lobbied on the trigger within the Legislature. He’s out in entrance of different sporting teams right here, together with the influential Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine, which has not but embraced Sunday searching.
Hunter Nation is most notable for its affect in Wisconsin politics and lobbying throughout the nation to liberalize searching seasons. Hilgemann is a Republican operative based mostly in that state and as soon as ran the highest advocacy group based by David and Charles Koch, the billionaire brothers identified for a community of influential conservative teams.
The searching group sued Wisconsin final yr to drive a wolf hunt that has been on maintain throughout a wider combat with environmental teams and tribes. It additionally backed a Republican-backed “Sporting Freedom Bundle” of payments that died or have been vetoed by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers. It lobbied on Sunday searching in Maine and labored on a profitable Virginia effort to broaden it there.
“For us, we simply can’t give you a great motive as to why hunters shouldn’t be allowed to pursue a authorized moral tag that they’ve bought on Sunday simply because this outdated regulation prohibits them from doing so,” Hilgemann stated.
Hunter Nation has gained consideration for its affiliation with Nugent, who was named the group’s “nationwide spokesman” final summer season. His music profession peaked within the Seventies. Since then, he has turn into an activist referred to as a lot for his excessive feedback, together with in 2014, when he referred to then-President Barack Obama as a “subhuman mongrel.”
