https://apnews.com/b30ea97cd47b7cbe387e114d6dbfab4a

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — U.S. government attorneys will appear before a federal judge Friday to defend a decision from the waning days of the Trump administration to lift protections for gray wolves across most of the nation, as states step up efforts to drive down wolf numbers through aggressive hunting and trapping.

Wildlife advocates argue the state-sponsored hunts including in Wisconsin, Idaho and Montana could quickly reverse the gray wolf’s recovery over the past several decades in large areas of the West and Midwest.