March 3, 2016, Bozeman, MT

Today, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service once again proposed to remove the Yellowstone-region grizzly bear population from the endangered and threatened species list. The Service previously sought to remove the Yellowstone-region grizzly bear population from the list of species protected under the Endangered Species Act in 2007. Earthjustice challenged that action in court and won in the U.S. District Court of Montana in 2009 and in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in 2011.

The following is a statement from Tim Preso, Earthjustice’s managing attorney for our Northern Rockies regional office who has been working for decades to protect the grizzly bear:

“The track of the great grizzly is an iconic symbol of the wildness that still exists in the Northern Rockies region despite being eradicated from other parts of the western United States. We have worked for decades to safeguard the region’s grizzly bears from habitat destruction, excessive killing and other threats—both to protect the grizzly bears themselves and because a landscape that is wild enough to sustain grizzlies is also wild enough to sustain the countless other wildlife species that make this region a special place.

“Earthjustice will closely examine the Service’s action to ensure that the Yellowstone region’s irreplaceable grizzly bear population is adequately protected.”