WASHINGTON—Humane World for Animals and Humane World Action Fund, formerly called Humane Society of the United States and Humane Society Legislation Fund, issued the following statement today after President Donald Trump announced a new executive order designed to weaken federal protections for wolves as part of a package of concessions that attempt to placate the livestock industry. During a White House event on Friday afternoon, the President suggested that ranchers should be able to shoot wolves at will, which U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins noted that kind of wildlife killing is not allowed where wolves are federally protected.
The text of the executive order has not yet been made public, but according to reporting from USA Today and remarks made at the White House event, the order directs the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to reconsider federal protections for gray and Mexican wolves, and to pressure states to eliminate state-level legal protections in jurisdictions like Washington and California.
Sara Amundson, president of Humane World Action Fund, said:
“Scapegoating wolves is a cynical and performative gesture given the immense harm that the Trump administration has inflicted on our nation's ranchers with irresponsible tariffs. Fewer than 1% of cows and sheep are killed by wild carnivores, including wolves, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture data. But removing protections for more of this intelligent, family-oriented species, still recovering from organized killing campaigns that brought them to the brink of extinction in the lower 48 states, will result in untold death and cruelty for these animals. Gray wolves should not have to take the fall for an administration whose reckless tariff policies have made life unnecessarily hard for American ranchers.”
Kitty Block, president and CEO of Humane World for Animals, said:
“The war on wolves needs to end, not escalate. They remain absent from much of their historic range and vulnerable to the same cruel trophy hunting, recreational trapping, bounties and other relentless killing that nearly wiped them out of the lower 48 states. Rolling back federal protections now—or setting that process in motion—would jeopardize decades of recovery and open the door for brutal killing. Gray wolves are essential to healthy ecosystems, and decisions about their survival should be based on science, not political favors to farmers and ranchers whose livelihoods are threatened not by wolves but by tone-deaf global trade policies.”
News reports indicate that the executive order also directs U.S. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum to prepare legislative recommendations as well. In December 2025, the U.S. House of Representatives already voted to delist gray wolves and block judicial review of that action. Depending on how the administration implements the directive, it could lead to a new effort to remove Endangered Species Act protections from gray wolves across much of the lower 48 states, including by revisiting the nationwide delisting rule issued during the first Trump administration in 2020. That delisting rule was later struck down by a federal court in a lawsuit brought by Humane World for Animals and our allies.
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