{"id":250062,"date":"2025-10-25T04:43:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-25T04:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/250062\/"},"modified":"2025-10-25T04:43:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-25T04:43:08","slug":"trump-admin-blocks-colorados-canadian-gray-wolf-imports-jeopardizing-reintroduction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/250062\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump Admin Blocks Colorado\u2019s Canadian Gray Wolf Imports, Jeopardizing Reintroduction"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Trump administration has told Colorado to stop importing gray wolves from Canada for its reintroduction program, a shift that could complicate plans for additional releases this winter. <\/p>\n

The directive came in a letter this month from U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Brian Nesvik to Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) Director Jeff Davis, according to the Fence Post agricultural news publication. Nesvik wrote that wolves used to build Colorado\u2019s population must come from Northern Rockies states, not from Canada or Alaska.<\/p>\n

Why It Matters<\/p>\n

Colorado began releasing wolves west of the Continental Divide in 2023 after voters narrowly approved reintroduction in 2020. Roughly 30 wolves now roam mountainous regions of the state, and the management plan envisions a long-term population that could exceed 200 animals. The program has faced fierce opposition in rural areas, <\/a>where some wolves have attacked livestock, and the federal guidance marks a break from the posture under President Joe Biden, whose administration oversaw the first two winters of releases.<\/p>\n

\"\"What To Know<\/p>\n

The new position collides with Colorado\u2019s current sourcing plan. <\/a>The state intends to relocate 10 to 15 wolves this winter under an agreement with the British Columbia Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship, Colorado Parks and Wildlife spokesperson Luke Perkins said Friday. He said the agreement was signed before the state received Nesvik\u2019s letter and that the agency \u201ccontinues to evaluate all options to support this year\u2019s gray wolf releases\u201d in light of the \u201crecent guidance\u201d from Fish and Wildlife.<\/p>\n

Although some wolves were previously obtained from Oregon, recent releases have come from British Columbia. Northern Rockies states that reintroduced Canadian wolves in the 1990s \u2014 including Idaho, Montana and Wyoming \u2014 have signaled they do not want to supply animals to Colorado, raising the possibility of a sourcing logjam if the federal directive stands.<\/p>\n

At issue is how strictly the federal government is interpreting its 2023 rule that created an \u201cexperimental\u201d population designation for Colorado wolves. A federal notice describing that designation referred to the Northern Rockies as the \u201cpreferred\u201d source of wolves, not a required one. <\/p>\n

Gov. Jared Polis\u2019 office told the Associated Press it is in contact with the Interior Department and evaluating \u201call options\u201d to keep this winter\u2019s releases on track. Fish and Wildlife Service spokesperson Garrett Peterson did not immediately return an AP message seeking comment; his voicemail said he would be unavailable until after the government shutdown ends.<\/p>\n

In January, Republican Colorado representatives condemned the CPW operation for importing “foreign wolves” into the state, while demanding that the Department of the Interior intervene and that the incoming Trump administration “take immediate action by stopping further importation of these foreign predators into the United States.”<\/p>\n

What People Are Saying<\/p>\n

Defenders of Wildlife attorney Lisa Saltzburg said Fish and Wildlife is \u201ctwisting language\u201d by asserting that Colorado cannot import wolves from Canada or Alaska: \u201cPeople in Colorado should be proud of their state\u2019s leadership in conservation and coexistence, and the wolf reintroduction program illustrates those values.”<\/p>\n

Republican Colorado U.S. Representatives\u00a0Lauren Boebert<\/a>, Jeff Crank, Gabe Evans and Jeff Hurd released a joint statement in January: “After years of slighting or outright ignoring Colorado farmers and ranchers with politically appointed anti-agricultural activists and ‘meat-free days,’ bureaucrats in Colorado have rushed through the importation of Canadian gray wolves and have set them loose in our state despite numerous protests and questions about the legality of this dysfunctional and chaotic approach.”<\/p>\n

What Happens Next<\/p>\n

If the federal stance holds, Colorado could face a shortage of available source animals just as it seeks to expand the herd. That would leave the state caught between local ballot-box mandates to restore wolves and a federal restriction that limits where those wolves can come from.<\/p>\n

This article includes reporting by the Associated Press.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Trump administration has told Colorado to stop importing gray wolves from Canada for its reintroduction program, a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":250063,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[4,2430,103,3832,79,644,201,24430],"class_list":{"0":"post-250062","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-british-columbia","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-colorado","12":"tag-science","13":"tag-trump-administration","14":"tag-wildlife","15":"tag-wolves"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250062"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250062\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}