Wild horses to remain in North Dakota's Theodore Roosevelt National Park, lawmaker says

Wild horses will stay in North Dakota's Theodore Roosevelt National Park amid fears from advocates that park officials would remove the beloved animals from the rugged Badlands landscape, a key lawmaker said Thursday.

Republican U.S. Sen. John Hoeven said he has secured a commitment from the National Park Service to maintain the park's roughly 200 horses. His office said the Park Service will abandon its proposed removal of the horses under an environmental review process begun in 2022.

“This will allow for a healthy herd of wild horses to be maintained at the park, managed in a way to support genetic diversity among the herd and preserve the park’s natural resources,” Hoeven’s office said in a statement.

Park visitors, much to their delight, often encounter the horses while driving or hiking in the rolling, colorful Badlands where a young, future President Theodore Roosevelt hunted and ranched in the 1880s.

The horses roam the park’s South Unit near the Western tourist town of Medora. In 2022, park officials began the process of crafting a “livestock plan” for the horses as well as about nine longhorn cattle in the park’s North Unit near Watford City. Park officials have said that process aligned with policies to remove non-native species when they pose a potential risk to resources.

“The horse herd in the South Unit, particularly at higher herd sizes, has the potential to damage fences used for wildlife management, trample or overgraze vegetation used by native wildlife species, contribute to erosion and soil-related impacts… and compete for food and water resources,” according to a Park Service environmental assessment from September 2023.

Proposals included removing the horses quickly or gradually or taking no