Saving Seafood

Trump’s plan to merge ESA offices could be a hard sell

May 7, 2025 — Businessman Howard Lutnick provided a seemingly straightforward answer when a Democratic senator asked him earlier this year whether he was considering moving NOAA Fisheries out of NOAA.

“No,” Lutnick said.

Strictly speaking, Lutnick’s written answer to a question posed by Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) still holds up. Since his confirmation as Commerce secretary, Lutnick has not proposed a wholesale relocation of NOAA Fisheries.

But as part of its new fiscal 2026 budget proposal, the Trump administration revived a proposal to move to the Interior Department the NOAA Fisheries office that handles Endangered Species Act and Marine Mammal Protection Act issues.

The partial merger has been floated before, but it’s never gone very far. If the Trump administration is serious about pursuing the idea now, it will confront entrenched bureaucracies, congressional turf conflicts and a lot of very serious questions, former officials and advocacy organization leaders predict.

“It seems consolidating ESA functions would make sense to ensure consistent application of the law,” said Greg Sheehan, former FWS deputy director in the first Trump administration.

Read the full story at E&E News

US proposes looser interpretation of law that protects threatened species

April 17, 2025 — The Trump administration on Wednesday proposed a major change to how threatened species are considered in agency actions by removing regulatory language that seeks to prevent their habitats from being degraded.

The move was aligned with President Donald Trump’s pledge to unwind what he says are burdensome federal regulations for businesses.

The Endangered Species Act is a key regulatory consideration for agencies when considering whether to grant permits for oil and gas, mining, electric transmission and other operations on federal lands and water. Under federal law, agencies are required to evaluate the environmental impact of proposed industry operations that could threaten endangered species.

In a regulatory notice, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service, divisions of the Departments of Interior and Commerce, proposed to rescind the definition of “harm” included in their ESA regulations.

Read the full story at Reuters

Court says NOAA must explain lack of protective measures for corals

March 10, 2025 — A federal judge has ordered NOAA to explain why it declined to adopt regulations to protect 20 coral species designated in 2014 as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

In a 42-page decision, Judge Micah W.J. Smith of the District Court of Hawaii said NOAA Fisheries, also known as the National Marine Fisheries Service, failed to provide adequate explanation for denying a 2020 petition from the Center for Biological Diversity to impose protective measures for the species that live Florida, the Caribbean, and the Indo-Pacific region and are threatened by the impacts of climate change.

“Even under [a] highly deferential standard of review, two facets of NMFS’ denial letter fall short,” Smith wrote. “NMFS offered no reasoned explanation for declining to protect the threatened coral species from their gravest threat, climate change. And for one set of the threatened species, the Caribbean corals, NMFS offered no reasoned explanation for declining to adopt regulations addressing localized threats.”

Read the full article at E&E News

Conservation groups sue NOAA Fisheries over protection for Pacific Northwest spring-run Chinook salmon

February 27, 2025 — Conservation groups are suing NOAA Fisheries after the agency missed the one-year deadline for ruling on a petition seeking Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections for spring-run Chinook salmon in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States.

“These iconic fish are at risk of disappearing from our coastal rivers forever if [NOAA Fisheries] doesn’t act quickly,” Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) Legal Fellow Jeremiah Scanlan said in a statement. “Spring-run Chinook salmon badly need protections, but instead, the agency has taken the lazy river approach and drifted past its own deadlines.”

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Wild Fish Conservancy to sue NOAA over missed deadlines for potential Chinook salmon protections

February 12, 2025 — Conservation advocacy group Wild Fish Conservancy (WFC) plans to sue NOAA Fisheries after the agency missed deadlines for responding to its petition seeking Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections for Chinook salmon in Alaska.

WFC announced in January 2024 that it was petitioning the government to implement protections for the species due to “the severe decline and poor condition of Chinook populations” in Alaska. WFC listed several factors contributing to the fish population’s drastic decline, including mixed-stock commercial and sport fishing, bycatch from industrial trawlers, climate change, logging and mining operations, and competition from hatchery-raised fish.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Supreme Court Declines To Hear Challenge Of Vineyard Wind

January 13, 2025 — The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear the challenge of Vineyard Wind brought by the Nantucket-based nonprofit ACK For Whales, effectively ending the group’s legal effort to stop or delay the wind farm under construction southwest of the island.

The effort to bring its case to the nation’s highest court was a long shot – as the U.S. Supreme Court accepts only 2 percent of the 7,000 cases brought to it each year – and on Monday the court informed ACK For Whales that it had declined to hear its petition for certiorari.

ACK For Whales had alleged that the federal agencies that permitted the Vineyard Wind project violated the Endangered Species Act by concluding that the project’s construction likely would not jeopardize the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale. The group also asserted that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management had violated the National Environmental Policy Act by relying on a “flawed analysis” from the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Two lower courts had previously dismissed the case, and the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on Monday brings ACK For Whales’ legal challenge of the Vineyard Wind project to an end.

Read the full article at the Nantucket Current

US Western Pacific council fighting push to name giant clams under Endangered Species Act

December 10, 2024 — The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council (WPRFMC), which has authority over the stewardship of fisheries in the state and territorial waters of Hawaii and the U.S. Pacific Islands, is pushing back against a proposal to list giant clams in the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA).

“I feel NMFS is just ramming this through the system,” said WPRFMC Council Member Sylvian Igisomar, who is also the chair of the Northern Mariana Islands Department of Lands and Natural Resources.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

NOAA Fisheries agrees to make decision on tope shark protections by August 2025

December 9, 2024 — NOAA Fisheries has agreed to determine whether tope sharks deserve protections under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) by August 2025 following a lawsuit from conservation legal groups Defend Them All and the Center for Biological Diversity.

“We’re optimistic that long-overdue protections for the tope shark are finally on the horizon,” Defend Them All attorney Lindsey Zehel said in a statement. “As compounding threats to the species continue to intensify, immediate action is necessary to halt the tope shark’s decline and preserve the integrity of our coastal ecosystems.”

Read the full story at Seafood Source

The ESA is about to board the Trump roller coaster

December 4, 2024 — The incoming Trump administration and its emboldened congressional allies could soon reshape the Endangered Species Act without really touching the 1973 law.

The GOP-controlled Congress could rescind last-minute ESA-related actions. Appropriations bill riders and targeted legislation could block Biden-era moves.

Office budgets could be cut, if Congress goes along. By themselves, the Interior Department’s new political appointees could rewrite Biden administration regulations.

“I expect they will just have a knee-jerk reaction and pull back regs, shooting themselves in the foot on a policy that could be incredibly useful for infrastructure and agriculture,” said Timothy Male, executive director of the Environmental Policy Innovation Center.

Male cited as an example a Biden-era rule change that gives the Fish and Wildlife Service the power to require compensatory mitigation, also known as offsets, as part of the ESA consultations conducted with other federal agencies.

If history is any guide, a congressional rewrite of the law will remain a bridge too far.

The ESA regulations, by contrast, are a ripe target for every new administration.

The first Trump administration, starting in 2017, rewrote crucial ESA regulations that covered issues from how critical habitat is designated to how costs are taken into account when a species is proposed for listing as threatened or endangered.

This package of ESA revisions drew hundreds of thousands of mostly critical comments. Once implemented, they were entangled in litigation. Some, though not all, were subsequently withdrawn and rewritten in the Biden administration.

Read the full story at E&E News

Save LBI files notice of intent to sue Atlantic Shores to halt offshore wind project

October 9, 2024 — Citizens group Save Long Beach Island has notified federal agencies of its intent to sue offshore wind developer Atlantic Shores under the Endangered Species Act and the Outer Continental Shelf Act.

The notices give the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration 60 days to resolve issues raised in the filings before the group pursues litigation, according to a news release from Save LBI.

An Atlantic Shores spokesperson said the company cannot comment on active litigation.

Read the full article at the The Press of Atlantic City