MAGA Keeps Sneaky Canadian Wolves At Bay
Belated trigger warning,
Belated trigger warning. There’s animal cruelty in this post, just as there is cruelty to humans in many of our posts, and from the exact same people.
The self-proclaimed Christians in the Trump administration might not have a problem with choosing to starve children, be it at home through cutting SNAP or abroad by gutting USAID, but at least they aren’t literally bringing wolves to anyone’s door. Even if K9 attack units are high on ICE’s Christmas wish list along with flamethrowers and a little goddamn respect.
It’s actually the opposite in Colorado, where a new federal order is jeopardizing the state’s dogged efforts to reintroduce gray wolves into their former habitat by insisting imported animals can’t come from stinky Canada anymore.
Colorado must “immediately cease and desist any and all efforts related to the capture, transport and/or release of gray wolves not obtained” from northern Rocky Mountain states, according to a recent letter from US Fish and Wildlife Service top dog Brian Nesvik.
The problem is that northern Rocky Mountain red states — Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana — don’t want to capture wolves in the wild as they prefer killing them willy nilly instead.
Colorado wildlife officials began setting more wolves free west of the Continental Divide after voters narrowly approved a reintroduction program in 2020 that was embraced by the blue state’s mostly Democratic urban corridor but not so much in rural areas where ranchers worry about attacks on cattle and hunters see them as competition for elk and deer. You can see why people might not want them around much anymore because, unlike Haitian immigrants, wolves pose an actual threat to their cats and dogs, although the state is willing to pony up the market value of up to $15,000 for any proven lost livestock.
It’s worth noting there hasn’t been a fatal wolf attack recorded in the Lower 48 since 1893, and gray wolves were mostly wiped out by the early 1900s by government-sponsored poisoning and bounty hunting. The plan was to reintroduce dozens of them over the next few years to fill one of their last remaining major habitat gaps in the west. Colorado turned to Oregon as a source when neighboring states refused to cooperate, but the release of up to 15 wolves this winter is now up in the air because these lupus non grata originally hail from British Columbia, where hardly anyone voted for Trump last year.
MAGA normally loves predators so it’s possible comedian Michelle Wolf is somehow to blame as the Big Bad Wolf for being so mean to them. Or maybe Michael Wolff as correct spelling isn’t really their thing.
It’s a tricky one given the deal with BC was arranged long before the federal government shut down to slow down the release of the Epstein files, but the new rule hinges entirely on the wording from his Biden-appointed predecessor when designating the experimental program that simply called the northern Rockies the “preferred” source of wolves. Not unlike how The Most Interesting Man in the World prefers Dos Equis but is open to other beers. And it’s not as if Colorado can just get them from Qatar.
Brian Nesvik isn’t a billionaire or Fox News personality like most of Dear Leader’s ghoulish Cabinet but the name might ring a bell from the global fury sparked through his previous gig as Wyoming’s chief wildlife officer.
A man named Cody Roberts hit a young female wolf with his snowmobile in 2024 and proceeded to tape her mouth shut before proudly torturing her to death before witnesses at a local pub. He was dinged a discretionary $250 fine but could’ve faced up to a grand and six months in jail if minions hadn’t given the sick puppy a slap on the wrist instead.
Although it might’ve gone even worse for him if he’d pulled this shit in Colorado, where killing a wolf can bring a $100,000 fine and up to a year in jail. At least for now as Lauren Boebert, somehow still the representative for Colorado’s mostly rural Fourth Congressional District, introduced a bill earlier this year called the Pet and Livestock Protection Act that would delist them from protection on the Endangered Species Act. Or re-delist them as this already happened at the tail end of the first Trump term but was overturned by one of those meddling activist judges in 2022.
But Roberts isn’t out of the woods yet. A grand jury indicted him on new charges of felony cruelty to animals in August, a crime that could put the Green River Bar killer in a cage of his own for up to two years. Although surely Nesvik would put in a word with the boss for a pardon if convicted. Maybe even a medal.
[AP / WyoFile / Outdoor Life / Wonkette BlueSky Starter Pack]
There has never been a better time to support independent media. Though the 1930s might have come close, if we had had blogs back then.
Did I miss the trigger warning on this, because I got warned away from it before I had scrolled too far.
TRIGGER WARNING disturbing picture and story!
Here's a suggestion for those having hard time with this post, go to the Cakes We Like post as an OT. That has some sweeet pics.
https://www.wonkette.com/p/those-cakes-we-like-are-going-loco?r=2knfuc&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false