BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — 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.