President Donald Trump’s administration has lifted the endangered species protections on gray wolves nationwide, ending 45 years of federal legal protection. Interior Secretary David Bernhardt said Thursday that the species had made a spectacular recovery under the Endangered Species Act, with numbers topping 6,000. Other wolf species remain on the list, some with populations only in the hundreds. En route to hunt elk in Colorado, Bernhardt said, “Today’s action reflects the Trump Administration’s continued commitment to species conservation.” Conservationists told the Denver Post they are planning their own lawsuits against the delisting of gray wolves. Wolves’ inclusion on the federal list of endangered species has faced legal challenges for decades in the Western United States, and a number of state-level exceptions exist. In Colorado, for example, ranchers are allowed to kill wolves if the animals threaten livestock, and hunting them is legal in Wyoming.
