Wyoming’s US Senator John Barrasso sharply criticized federal judges for their handling of the grizzly bear management in the Greater Yellowstone Area. Barrasso says the Endangered Species Act has helped bring iconic species like the bald eagle back from the brink of extinction and has established a list of federally protected species with the express goal of seeing them fully recovered and eventually removed from the list. However, Barrasso says too often in making their rulings, judges bend the law to their personal views.
“This decades’ long commitment of time and resources cannot continue if the states’ good work is simply ignored by liberal Courts,” Barrasso said.
Barrasso says frivolous lawsuits from environmental groups tie up the delisting process for years and fully recovered species remain under Washington’s control. This results in growing populations of recovered but still listed species like the grizzly bear. Barrasso points out that grizzly bears have more than doubled their range since the mid-70s and now occupy more than 22,500 square miles of the ecosystem – and they are at or near the maximum carrying capacity for the bears in that ecosystem.
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