Which is what happens when politics is more important than truth.
Washington State University is disavowing statements made by one of their own researchers who choose to jump into the debate about a Wolf pack in northeastern Washington. Washington Fish and Wildlife is eliminating the Profanity Peak pack in Ferry County near Republic. The wolves have been reportedly killing cattle in that area. The director of WSU’s large carnivore conservation lab Dr. Rob Wielgus told the Seattle Times last week that the rancher elected to put his livestock directly on top of the den. WSU clarified stating it was inaccurate, and that the rancher in fact released his cattle four miles from the den. After initially making that statement to the Seattle Times Dr. Wielgus acknowledged to the paper that he had no basis in fact to make such a statement. WSU says that Dr. Wielgus’ inaccurate and inappropriate comments have contributed substantially to the growing anger and confusion on the issue and that they “do not in any way represent the views or position of Washington State University”. The statement from WSU continued on to say that it will not and cannot condone statements that compromise research integrity. The institution will be reviewing their policies to try to prevent this from happening again while issuing an apology to the public and science partners.