They spent millions to win.Then they fired the people who could stop them.
buy a WI court seat
delisting accelerates
that justifies any of this
This is a two-part con. Part one: spend big to buy the political outcome. Part two: gut the federal scientists and agencies who would otherwise catch you doing it.
We’ve spent months tracing both halves of this machine — who’s funding the push to strip wolves of protection, and what’s happening, in the same months, to the federal capacity that’s legally required to exist before that can happen responsibly. Line them up side by side and this stops looking like politics as usual. It looks like a plan.
The machine that buys the outcome
In March 2025, Hunter Nation — a group that files with the IRS as a tax-exempt charity — launched a $1.8 million campaign to install Brad Schimel on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, the one body that could stand between this machine and an open season on wolves. The ads starred Donald Trump Jr., who sits on Hunter Nation’s board and called the group “the special strike force of the center-right.” They targeted 800,000 Wisconsin voters. They lost — Crawford won, 55 to 45. So the fight moved to Congress, where H.R. 845, stripping wolves of federal protection and barring courts from reviewing it, has already passed the House.
This is what they’re spending it on.
Fronted the $1.8M ad campaign for a state judicial race — over wolves.
Wrote the bill to delist wolves and bar judicial review of it. Top donors: the billionaires who bankrolled Project 2025.
Now separately petitioning to strip the federal review that limits elephant and lion trophy imports. Same appetite, different continent.
Since 2011, Utah’s legislature has poured nearly $6 million of taxpayer money into delisting wolves — including the ones here in the Great Lakes. Most of it, $5.13 million, went to a group called Big Game Forever, founded by Don Peay and Ryan Benson.
Don Peay is the same man who, representing Hunter Nation, asked Utah lawmakers for another $500,000 this year. This isn’t two separate stories. It’s one machine, wearing different names in different states — and Wisconsin’s wolves are the target no matter which name is on the letterhead.
Meanwhile, they’re firing the referee
Here’s the part almost nobody is watching. Federal law requires “adequate regulatory mechanisms” to remain in place before a species can lose its protections — real science, real monitoring, real enforcement capacity. At the exact moment this machine is spending millions to force delisting through, the federal agencies that would provide that oversight are being dismantled, agency by agency.
Has already lost nearly 1,800 employees — roughly a fifth of its staff — including at least 530 biologists and more than 100 senior regional staff. Its FY2027 budget request cuts funding another 20%, from $1.65B to $1.3B. The same director overseeing these cuts says the agency still expects to finalize 15 delisting rules this fiscal year.
Faces a proposed 90% cut to its entire Ecosystems Mission Area — the $307 million division and roughly 1,200 scientists who produce the wildlife research any delisting decision is supposed to rest on. A former USGS research chief called it a generational catastrophe that won’t be rebuilt once it’s gone.
Closing research facilities in 31 states and moving its headquarters out of Washington to Salt Lake City. Regional research capacity across the Great Lakes wolf range is being consolidated out of the region entirely — into Colorado and Utah.
Staffing down roughly 15–17%, with project funding down nearly 30% from two years ago — the exact program responsible for responding when livestock conflict actually happens.
While the agencies built to watch this go quiet.
You don’t accidentally cut the referee’s staff by a fifth in the same year you’re racing to finalize delisting rules. You don’t accidentally propose zeroing out the science division while a $1.8 million campaign works the courts next door. This is one plan, run from two directions at once — buy the outcome, and disable anything that could catch you.
They have the money and the majority in Congress right now. What they don’t have is people watching closely enough to say so out loud, in public, with the receipts. That’s the part where you come in.
We are entirely volunteer-run. No corporate money. No billionaire backers. Just the receipts, followed all the way to the end — and the people willing to keep paying for the gas to get there.
Help us keep watching the watchers.
Your gift funds the FOIA requests, the hearing testimony, and the investigations that turn dark money into daylight — before the next delisting rule is final.
Great Lakes Wildlife Alliance is a 501(c)(3) · tax-deductible · no corporate funding, ever
For the pack,
Melissa Smith Founder & Executive Director · Great Lakes Wildlife Alliance / Speak for WildlifeP.S. — They can outspend us. They cannot out-watch us. Every dollar you send tonight goes straight to making sure this machine has to operate in the light. Chip in and help us keep following the money.
Hunter Nation $1.8M campaign, Trump Jr. quote, race outcome: PR Newswire, WisPolitics, Urban Milwaukee (Mar.–Apr. 2025). H.R. 845: Rep. Tiffany House press releases. Utah audits & Big Game Forever findings: KSL.com, Salt Lake Tribune, Deseret News, Utah Investigative Journalism Project (2013–2024). FWS staffing/budget: Center for Biological Diversity FOIA data, Oregon Capital Chronicle, Sen. Whitehouse/Reed statement (Dec. 2025); FY2027 figures via Congressional Research Service. USGS Ecosystems Mission Area: NPR, E&E News/POLITICO, congress.gov CRS brief (2025–26). USFS and APHIS figures per GLWA internal research file — confirm current status before public use.
Great Lakes Wildlife Alliance / Speak for Wildlife · P.O. Box 259891, Madison, WI 53715
speakforwildlife.org · msmith@wiwolvesandwildlife.org
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