HELENA, MT – Conservation groups are gearing up to take the federal government to court to preserve the protected status of gray wolves across the country.

The Center for Biological Diversity in a Tuesday letter, informed the U.S. Wildlife Service that it intends to file a lawsuit alleging the agency violated the Endangered Species Act by not preparing a national gray wolf recovery plan.

The letter, addressed to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and USFWS Director Brian Nesvik, says that the agency is “attempting to skirt its duty” to develop a nationwide recovery plan, and unlawfully stated that wolves would not benefit from a recovery plan.

“FWS has made numerous premature efforts to reduce or remove federal protections for wolves under the ESA, which the courts have nearly universally rejected,” wrote Collette Adkins, senior attorney for Center for Biological Diversity. “The only successful delisting effort was in the Northern Rocky Mountains, where Congress (through a rider to an appropriations bill) directed FWS to remove wolf protections. Since then, the Center and its allies have submitted petitions to relist wolves in the northern Rockies and across the West, which FWS denied. In August 2025, the U.S. District Court for Montana ruled that FWS unlawfully denied the petitions and remanded to FWS for new analysis.”

In mid-November, USFWS announced it would not release a National Wolf Recovery Plan, despite previously announcing a plan was in the works last year. The agency said the species doesn’t need federal protection.

The move comes as wolves are in the crosshairs of members of Congress who have proposed multiple bills to delist the species from the Endangered Species Act nationwide.

In the United States, wolves are managed in three different groups.

In the Northern Rockies — Montana, Idaho, Wyoming and parts of Washington and Oregon — wolves were removed from the endangered species list and are managed by their respective state wildlife agencies, which allow hunting.

A population of wolves in Minnesota are listed as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act, while wolves in the remaining 44 U.S. states are listed as endangered species.

The letter from the Center for Biological Diversity says that the “piecemeal” recovery efforts have prevents a nation-wide recovery of the species.

“Reliance on such an outdated and geographically restricted plan prevents FWS from facilitating nationwide wolf recovery, including in places such as the West Coast, Southern Rocky Mountains, and the Northeast,” the letter states. “For these reasons, the failure to develop a nationwide wolf recovery plan violates the agency’s mandatory duty under Section 4(f) of the ESA.”

Adkins said the Center will pursue litigation in U.S. District Court if the Fish and Wildlife Service does not make any changes to its current stance on wolf recovery.

In the most recent federal litigation, which saw a federal judge in Missoula vacate the government’s determination that gray wolves in the Western U.S. don’t need increased protections under the Endangered Species Act back in August, was brought by several coalitions of conservation groups, including the Center for Biological Diversity.

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