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LETTER: …well past time to once and for all delist the gray wolf and reinstitute a hunt in Minnesota as part of our local management

Dear Editor:

The following are comments I made recently on the House floor on gray wolves.

Mr. Speaker,

I rise today in celebration of the gray wolf being fully recovered.

Gray wolves have never been extinct in Minnesota. We currently estimate our population at over 2,700 gray wolves, while the ESA Recovery Plan goal for our state is 1,400. In fact, we have more wolves than the rest of the lower 48 states combined.

The Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden Administrations, along with our very own Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, have all agreed: it is a scientific fact that the gray wolf has recovered.

On my chart here, you can see clearly the gray wolf has recovered. The blue dotted line is the federal recovery plan and the green dotted line is the minimum in Minnesota to reinstitute a wolf hunt. The wolf population is way up at the top, well above each threshold.

Unfortunately, radical activist groups have weaponized the Endangered Species Act to keep the gray wolf listed. This misguided effort is a clear danger to our deer herds, livestock and beloved family pets across Minnesota.

We have the scientists, the know-how, and the experience to responsibly manage the gray wolf, including implementing a hunting and trapping season.

When wolves are above their ESA targets, which they clearly are, federal bureaucrats in Washington, D.C. or judges in California should NOT be able to take away our management powers, just because of their ideological views, or because they want to give favors to radical activist groups. They should follow the science.

That’s why I introduced the “Trust The Science Act” with my friend and colleague, Rep. Lauren Boebert, to delist the wolf and exempt its delisting from judicial review.

It’s well past time to once and for all delist the gray wolf and reinstitute a hunt in Minnesota as part of our local management.

Let’s get the Federal government out of the way and properly manage our gray wolf population.

Our way of life in northern Minnesota depends on it.

Rep. Pete Stauber

Hermantown, MN

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