Bill Would De-List Wolves Across the Country

Wyoming’s US Senators last week introduced a bill that would once again address taking the grey wolf off the endangered species list.

U.S. Senators Ron Johnson and Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, along with Wyoming senators John Barrasso and Mike Enzi, introduced the bipartisan legislation Thursday that would delist the gray wolf in Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota and Wyoming under the Endangered Species Act of 1973, and allow wolf management plans based on federal and state wildlife expertise to move forward without legal ambiguity.

Johnson pointed out that gray wolf listing decisions should come from state wildlife experts, not partisan federal judges. Baldwin, a Democrat, added that she has supported a bipartisan effort to delist the gray wolf in Wisconsin since 2011 because of the scientific conclusion that the population has recovered in the Great Lakes region.

Barrasso noted that Wyoming had clearly demonstrated that a state can manage the gray wolf population successfully. Enzi clarified that the bill would allow states to manage the species without continued interference from the courts.

In late 2014, a judge in Washington, D.C. overruled a management plan for the gray wolf agreed to by the Department of the Interior and several states, returning the gray wolf to the endangered species list.