Labrador Letter: Grizzly Bears and Who Manages Idaho

Dear Friends,

The grizzly bear is one of the most emblematic animals of the Mountain West, and it is a perfect example of the federal government continuously overreaching into state affairs and management. The Endangered Species Act (ESA) has been a frequent vehicle bringing federal bureaucracy into states, particularly in the West. Spotted owls, wolves, salmon - each one with stifling regulation and economy-collapsing rules.

Grizzly bears were listed as a protected species in 1975. Fifty years later, the grizzly population has grown, and the bears have naturally pushed into areas where Idahoans live, work, and recreate. That expansion comes with public safety risks, damage to private property and livestock, and a heavy management burden on our state agencies and local communities.

Rulemaking to revise that 1975 listing is in progress right now. But in the meantime, we are stuck with a federal rule that governs what Idaho can and cannot do about the bears. The Trump Administration recently proposed a new version of that rule, with the stated goal of cutting needless federal bureaucracy and giving states more flexibility. I applaud that goal. However, this week I sent formal comments to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Fish and Wildlife Service Director Brian Nesvik explaining why the proposal does not yet get there.

As currently written, the proposal makes the paperwork and bureaucracy worse instead of better, and it hands more opportunities to the activist litigation machine that has been suing Idaho over wildlife management for years. That machine is already well-funded at taxpayer expense. A rule full of vague standards and multi-step approval processes is a gift to the environmental activist lawyers filing continuous lawsuits.

Here is one striking example: The proposal builds a new tier of restrictions around the idea that a grizzly bear might get caught in a trap set for another animal. The data says otherwise. Decades of year-round coyote trapping in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming produced no grizzly capture or injury. Neither did the expansion of Idaho's regulated wolf trapping seasons since 2011. Not one documented grizzly capture in a lawfully set trap. Zero.

So where did this manufactured concern come from? It first appeared in the Fish and Wildlife Service's 2024 assessment, tracking comments from a scientific peer reviewer who was, at the same time, a paid expert witness for Earthjustice, one of the non-profits responsible for the ongoing lawfare. That firm was suing to shut down wolf trapping across roughly half of Idaho. The peer reviewer told the government he had no conflicts of interest. That was clearly not true.

That is at the heart of my letter to the Administration. These lawsuits pay lip service to actual conservation while serving special interest fundraising and financing a proliferation of lawyers. Every hour my office spends defending against them is an hour and a dollar taken from actual conservation work that produces results.

I asked the Administration for two things above all. (1) Write clear, plain criteria into the rule so an Idaho trapper or a state biologist can read it and know what the law requires. And (2), respect the Constitution. Under the anti-commandeering doctrine, Washington D.C. cannot force a state to police its own citizens as the price of avoiding federal liability. The rule should plainly state so.

Much of the public comment already filed in this docket is typical advocacy campaign boilerplate letters that treat Idaho's agencies and local communities as if they had made no investment or sacrifice in this recovery. Idaho carried this program for fifty years, and we are the ones living with the successful results. We should not be handed even tighter restrictions as the reward. My office will continue to fight against federal overreach into Idaho's state affairs and our natural resources.

Best regards,