{"id":926788,"date":"2026-07-11T01:49:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T01:49:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/926788\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T01:49:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T01:49:14","slug":"interior-department-narrows-endangered-species-act-protections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/926788\/","title":{"rendered":"Interior Department narrows Endangered Species Act protections"},"content":{"rendered":"

PHOENIX (AP) \u2014 The Trump administration finalized a rule Friday that changes how agencies enforce the Endangered Species Act<\/a> and eliminates a key protection for imperiled wildlife against logging, oil drilling and other activities.<\/p>\n

The administration narrowed the definition of \u201charm\u201d under the landmark law \u2014 a change with broad implications.<\/p>\n

For decades, the government defined harm broadly to include encroachments on places with threatened and endangered animals. The change announced Friday<\/a> would allow oil and gas drilling, mining, logging and and other development on critical wildlife habitats so long as the animals themselves aren\u2019t killed or injured.<\/p>\n

Environmentalists warned the move could cause some species to go extinct by opening the door to habitat destruction<\/a>. Industry representatives and their Republican allies have long argued the landmark 1973 environmental law is wielded too broadly, to the detriment of economic growth. <\/p>\n

Administration officials said they were returning the law to its original intent, following a 2024 Supreme Court<\/a> decision that limited the authority of federal agencies to interpret environmental statutes passed by Congress. They described the government\u2019s prior definition of harm as an intrusion on private property rights.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s among a suite of changes to wildlife protections<\/a> that officials have pursued under President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor years, federal agencies abused the ESA to obstruct lawful land use and burden American families and businesses,\u201d Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement.<\/p>\n

The change was first proposed in April 2025 and environmentalists fought unsuccessfully to block it. Habitat destruction is the biggest cause of extinction, according to wildlife advocates.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is one of the most horrific attempts to harm wildlife in American history and a gift to the oil barons and foreign mining companies,\u201d said Aaron Weiss, the executive director of the Center for Western Priorities.<\/p>\n

The Endangered Species Act is credited with bringing back iconic animals \u2014 including the bald eagle, American alligator and California condor \u2014 from the brink of extinction.<\/p>\n

Republicans rolled back several provisions of the law in Trump\u2019s first term, only to have those moves reversed under Democratic President Joe Biden.<\/p>\n

__<\/p>\n

Brown reported from Billings, Montana.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX (AP) \u2014 The Trump administration finalized a rule Friday that changes how agencies enforce the Endangered Species…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":926789,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[27],"tags":[373858,5643,11029,18844,276,10109,10106,168,69,98171,9562,10102,6064,723,57,13673,13670,82,13668,29623,53197,80,159,61,67,370,132,68,837,13669,1669,17860],"class_list":["post-926788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-aaron-weiss","tag-arizona","tag-az-state-wire","tag-biodiversity","tag-california","tag-climate","tag-climate-and-environment","tag-domestic-news","tag-donald-trump","tag-doug-burgum","tag-endangered-species","tag-energy-industry","tag-fl-state-wire","tag-florida","tag-general-news","tag-id-state-wire","tag-idaho","tag-joe-biden","tag-montana","tag-mt-state-wire","tag-oil-and-gas-industry","tag-politics","tag-science","tag-u-s-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-government","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-wildlife","tag-wy-state-wire","tag-wyoming","tag-zoology"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116898835068671425","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/926788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=926788"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/926788\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/926789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=926788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=926788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=926788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}