Daniel M. Ashe was nominated as the Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on Dec. 3, 2010. However, Louisiana’s two senators, Republican David Vitter and Democrat Mary Landrieu, have placed a hold on his confirmation to try to force the Department of the Interior to issue deepwater drilling permits in the Gulf of Mexico.

 

Ashe’s father, William C. Ashe of Harvard, Massachusetts, is a former Wildlife Service deputy regional director who retired in 1990 after 37 years with the Wildlife Service.

 

 

Ashe traveled to Washington, D.C., on a 1982 National Sea Grant Congressional Fellowship. From 1982 to 1995, he worked with the House of Representatives as a staff member of the former Merchant Marines and Fisheries Committee, advising its members on environmental policy matters. Eventually he rose to the post of Staff Director of the Subcommittee on Environment and Natural Resources.

 

From 1995 to 1998, he served as the Fish and Wildlife Service’s Assistant Director for External Affairs. In this position he managed the Service's Congressional and public affairs, Native American and research coordination programs, the Federal Duck Stamp Program, the Sport Fishing and Boating Partnership Council, and the Federal Aid in Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration programs. In 1997, he was Service’s lead negotiator leading to the passage if the National Wildlife Refuge System Improvement Act.

 

From May 1998 to 2003, he was chief of the National Wildlife Refuge System, which entailed his overseeing all management of the 93-million-acre system.

 

In March 2003, Ashe was appointed Science Advisor to the Director of the Fish and Wildlife Service, advising the director on scientific applications to resource management. He held the post for six years until he was chosen to be the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Deputy Director for Policy in August 2009.

 

Ashe and his wife have two children