Dear Friend,

I must say that I am alarmed and shaken by the legislative attack on wolves from Republican leaders in the U.S. House in the wake of rancher Cody Roberts’ torture of a young female wolf in Wyoming. Even after the grim details of the torture of a wolf came to light in national and global press accounts, Republican leaders still chose to ram through the passage of H.R. 764 to complete the elimination of federal protections for gray wolves across their entire range in the lower 48 states.

The bill, led by U.S. Representative Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., passed 209-205 (Roll Call #169), with four Democrats favoring it and just four Republicans opposing it. In short, about 98 percent of House Democrats opposed the terrible bill and 98 percent of House Republicans favored it. Rep. Jared Huffman, D-Calif., led opposition to H.R. 764 on the floor.

We have, since inception, been a non-partisan organization. We want every lawmaker, regardless of political persuasion, to embrace the universal value of opposition to cruelty. Opposition to animal cruelty should never be a partisan value. That’s the approach we take every day in our work.

But there can be no mistaking that this was a tone-deaf move by Republican leaders to go after wolves just weeks after Wyoming’s retrograde wolf- treatment policies were put in the spotlight. Those inhumane and ruthless state policies were put in place by Wyoming lawmakers after a Congressional rider passed more than a decade ago delisting wolves in the Northern Rockies. Now federal lawmakers want to open up more states to assaults on wolves! We cannot let this happen!

Your contribution is vital in upholding our mission. For countless animals, the impact of our work is nothing short of life-saving.

In early April, facts came to light in national media about the late-February torture and killing of a wolf by a Sublette County rancher and trophy hunter named Cody Roberts. Roberts ran down a female adolescent wolf with a snowmobile, crushing her and injuring her, taking her into his possession, and then torturing her in front of patrons at a bar. He was fined just $250 for taking a live wild animal into his possession—about the cost of an expensive speeding ticket.

Animal Wellness Action, the Center for a Humane Economy, and other organizations are demanding state and federal prosecution of Roberts and have announced a $15,000 reward for information that contributes to his arrest and his incarceration for at least one year. We are about to expand the size of that reward to drive the flow of more intelligence on this case.

We’ve also called on Wyoming to revamp its wolf-treatment policies, eliminating its “predator zone” where, in 85 percent of the state, wolves and nearly a dozen other native wildlife species can be killed without limit, every day of the year, and by any method, including running wolves down in snowmobiles or even setting them on fire.

How could House Republican leaders—led by Natural Resources Committee Chairman Bruce Westerman, R-Arkansas, and Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La. —bring up this bill with this terrible fact pattern from Wyoming fresh in all of our minds?

Cody Roberts’ savage act of cruelty tells us all we need to know about the consequences of a federal delisting of wolves: a state-based free-for-all when it comes to killing and maiming and torturing them.

It’s legal, in some states that have delisted wolves, to run down wolves with snowmobiles, to allow packs of dogs to attack them, to use neck snares and leghold traps, and to kill them without limit in some circumstances.

The Republican-dominated vote amounts to a plan to allow unfiltered, appalling cruelty to wolves. The Democratic majority in the Senate should refuse to consider this toxic legislation. The good news is, the Biden Administration—which has generally been no major ally of wolf protection or other animal welfare policies—did issue a statement after the House vote saying it would veto the bill were it to pass the Senate.

Deciding which species are listed or delisted under the federal Endangered Species Act is a job best left to wildlife management professionals and the courts. This ham-handed intervention by the House of Representatives in federal endangered species management shows us exactly why the 118th Congress has become known for ineptness and dysfunction.

Kudos to Republicans who worked to retain federal wolf protection policies: Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, Matt Gaetz of Florida, Mike Garcia of California, and Nancy Mace of South Carolina. We are disappointed that so many of their Republican colleagues went along with the attack on wolves even after they saw what happened in Wyoming. (Eight other Republicans did not vote on the measure.)

We’ll work as hard as we can to block awful legislation from being taken up in the U.S. Senate. We’ll also be teeing up national legislation to ban the use of snowmobiles and other motorized vehicles to chase, run down, and run over wolves and other wildlife on our federal lands. And we are demanding that Wyoming not only prosecute Cody Roberts but also change its retrograde wolf policies.

The path to animal protection is not always linear. There are powerful forces who want to perpetuate mistreatment of animals for their benefit. They act as if the lives of animals don’t matter at all.

But every one of their lives matters to us—to you and me and our millions of backers. We’ll take our anger and indignation over terrible acts of cruelty and misguided policy decisions and turn it into the energy of reform.

That’s what we do every day, and I know you share my resolve in tackling the toughest problems for animals and forging lasting solutions. We will not give up on wolves or any other creature in crisis.

Please continue to enable us to do this work. For so many millions of animals, the work we do together is a matter of life and death.

Today, please write your two U.S. Senators here (and on Monday call them at 202-224-3121) and urge them to oppose any effort by Congress to remove federal protections for wolves. Senators must hear loud and clear that Congressional delisting of wolves would be a disaster for them nationwide.

For the animals,

Wayne Pacelle President Center for a Humane Economy