BILLINGS, Mont. - State officials in the Northern Rockies on Monday lined up against a federal proposal to give new protections to the carnivorous wolverine, as climate change threatens to melt the species' snowy mountain strongholds.

A pending U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposal would declare the rare, elusive animal a threatened species across the Lower 48 states.

That could end trapping for the ferocious member of the weasel family sometimes called the "mountain devil." And it would pave the way for Colorado to reintroduce wolverines in portions of the southern Rocky Mountains as part of a strategy to bolster their numbers ahead of future declines.

But Montana, Idaho and Wyoming officials insist federal protections aren't necessary for the estimated 250-300 wolverines that live across the West. Despite their uncertain future prospects, state officials said wolverines are doing well now and don't need federal intervention.

"There is no evidence suggesting that wolverines will not adapt sufficiently to diminished late spring snow pack (assuming there is any) to maintain viability," Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead wrote in a Monday letter to federal officials.

Wolverines depend on deep mountain snows, typically in remote mountainous areas, to build dens and raise their young.

Once found throughout the Rocky Mountains and in California's Sierra Nevada mountain range, wolverines were wiped out across most of the U.S. by the 1930s due to unregulated trapping and poisoning campaigns.

The population rebounded dramatically during the last century and wolverines are now found in the Northern Rockies, the North Cascades Range of Washington and the Wallowa Range of Oregon. Individual animals also have appeared in California and Colorado. Larger populations persist in Alaska and Canada.

Yet biologists say warming temperatures could shrink the wolverine's mountain habitat in the Lower 48 by as much as 60 percent over the next 80 years.

"You have a population that is expanding even as it's at risk. That looks strange to a lot of people," said Shawn Sartorius, lead wolverine biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. "But what people miss is listing (a species as threatened or endangered) is about projecting threats in the future."

He said he would not be surprised if other states also came out in opposition to the government proposal as the government works toward a final decision early next year.

In Montana, Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department director Jeff Hagener said Monday there is no imminent threat to wolverines. He accused federal officials of making a decision based on a hypothesis of what might happen instead of using the best available science. And in Idaho, the office of Gov. Butch Otter questioned how the federal government would help the wolverine in the Rockies if its primary threat is a global issue.

"We just question whether the Endangered Species Act is the proper mechanism through which we can regulate climate change," said Sam Eaton, legal counsel for Idaho's Office of Species Conservation.

Sartorius said his agency used the most up to date science it had, and added that there was no intention to use wolverines as leverage to regulate greenhouse gases.

Even if the animals were not listed, Colorado still could move forward on its own with a potential reintroduction program.

The state's timber and ski industries in the past have raised worries about wolverine reintroductions dampening development due to new land use restrictions. However, officials said the federal proposal would exclude most human activities from new regulations, potentially avoiding a fight between wildlife advocates and business interests.

Any reintroductions in Colorado would require approval from state wildlife commissioners and the Legislature, Colorado Parks and Wildlife spokesman Randy Hampton said.

Environmentalists want the federal government to act even more aggressively than what's been proposed, by designating wolverines as endangered, which affords more protections than a threatened listing.

Proponents of that view, including a coalition of wildlife advocacy and conservation groups, contend the danger of extinction has been understated.

Matthew Bishop with the Western Environmental Law Center said the government's population estimate masks the fact that only a fraction of the total population of 250-300 wolverines is capable of breeding.

"When you throw in the effects of climate change, which is already occurring and certain to occur in the future, they certainly warrant an endangered listing," he said.

Otter pardons 2 menconvicted of drug offenses

By HANNAH FURFARO/Associated Press

BOISE - Gov. Butch Otter on Monday pardoned two men who were convicted of peddling illegal drugs, served time in prison and are now turning their lives and careers around.

The pardons for Robert Thornton and Eric Hinckley mark the first time Otter has used his authority to grant clemency to offenders. It's also the first serious offender pardon in Idaho since 2000, when Dirk Kempthorne was governor. He also pardoned a drug dealer.

Otter acted on the unanimous recommendation of the Idaho Commission for Pardons and Parole. Despite the severity of their crimes, the Republican governor said both men had never been arrested before their offenses, have since admitted to their guilt, and have shown they're rehabilitated from their past behavior. Drug dealing, along with murder and rape, are among seven offenses in Idaho that require the governor to approve a pardon.

Thornton, 57, was convicted in 1992 of selling cocaine to undercover narcotics detectives in Ada County, while Hinckley, 37, was convicted after being charged in 2002 with selling methamphetamine to a confidential informant in Idaho Falls. Both men served prison time, underwent substance abuse treatment and counseling, and completed their paroles.

We send people "to prison to be rehabilitated and - we hope - to be redeemed as citizens, neighbors, fathers, husbands and taxpayers," Otter said in a statement. "Too often it doesn't work out that way. But for Robert Thornton and Eric Hinckley, it did. I'm proud of them."

Thornton sought his pardon based on a clean track record since his 1992 offense, which he told the pardon commission was his "single biggest mistake." In his pardon explanation letter, Otter said Thornton's 17 years of marriage, involvement with his children, and steady job as a construction superintendent convinced him that Thornton has learned from his mistakes.

Hinckley, with whom Otter had a face-to-face chat before Monday's announcement, has committed to a drug-free life and plans to enroll in Idaho State University's physician's assistant program.

Since 2004, he earned a bachelor's degree in health science from Boise State University and worked for nine years at Dale's Auto Sales in Boise.

Lisa Bostaph, a parole board commissioner and Boise State University criminal justice professor, said the commission more frequently grants pardons to offenders with lesser crimes like burglary, which don't need the governor's approval. The commission rarely hears pardons for serious offenses, like drug trafficking or murder.

In Thornton's and Hinckley's cases, she said, they've both become productive members of society and have used their experiences to teach their children.

"They both have made 180 degree turns in their lives and had maintained that change in their life for quite a while," she said.