WildEarth Guardians v. U.S. Department of Interior

The federal district court for the District of Montana ruled that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) should reconsider whether areas in southern Colorado and on national forest lands in Montana and Idaho should be designated as critical habitat for the Canadian lynx. The court rejected, however, a claim by the plaintiffs that FWS erred by not designating areas that could serve as “climate change refugia” in the future. The court said the plaintiffs’ arguments for such designations were at odds with a 2010 decision in which the court rejected essentially the same arguments.