Fight over US wolf protections heads to federal courtroom

By MATTHEW BROWN
Associated Press

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — U.S. government attorneys are set to appear before a federal judge to defend a decision from the waning days of the Trump administration that lifted protections for gray wolves across most of the country. The hearing on Friday before U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White in California comes as officials in Republican-led states including Wisconsin, Montana and Idaho have sought to drive down wolf numbers through aggressive hunting and trapping. Wildlife advocates say the hunts threaten to reverse the gray wolf’s recovery to large parts of the West and Midwest over the past several decades. They want a federal judge to restore protections for wolves under the Endangered Species Act.