Democrats urge Trump administration to rethink Endangered Species Act rollback

Florida manatees and panthers are suddenly much more vulnerable, environmentalists say, thanks to the Trump administration’s recently announced rollback of Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections.

Now Florida Democrats are calling on Secretary of Interior Doug Burgum and Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick to immediately withdraw their agencies’ final “blanket rule,” which they say would eliminate protections for threatened species and revise critical habitat exclusions.

The departments of the Interior and Commerce rescinded the definition of “harm” under the Endangered Species Act in a rule published earlier this month. That prompted four Democratic members of Congress on Monday to write in a letter to Burgum and Lutnick that removing habitat modification and degradation from the long-held definition of “harm” amounts “to an endorsement of habitat degradation.”

“Given that habitat loss is the leading cause of species extinction, the rule is in direct opposition to the ESA’s stated purpose ‘to provide a means whereby the ecosystems upon which endangered species and threatened species depend may be conserved,’ a key component for the conservation of species themselves,” says the letter, written by Democrats Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Kathy Castor, Darren Soto, and Maxwell Frost.

“This change will significantly impede efforts to protect and conserve our nation’s threatened and endangered species of fish, wildlife and plants,” the letter adds.

Among the species the ESA has saved from extinction since it was signed into law in 1973 are the Florida panther, the manatee, the American crocodile, and the hawksbill sea turtle.

“The rule change directly threatens the unique habitats that support the plants and animals for which our state is renowned,” the Democrats wrote. “Climate change coupled with unprecedented urban growth in Florida and around the nation has pushed our wildlife to the brink. This rule will significantly weaken the ESA and usher in the often-irreversible loss of habitat, hastening the extinction of plants and animals that are a vital part of our state’s culture and tourism economy.”

Burgum has said the changes are commonsense moves to eliminate red tape and restore landowners’ property rights.

“For years, federal agencies abused the ESA to obstruct lawful land use and burden American families and businesses,” Burgum said in a statement. “That approach turned routine activity into a regulatory trap, drove up costs that impacted people’s lives, and expanded federal authority beyond what Congress intended. This action restores common sense, respects private property, provides much-needed certainty for landowners and follows the statute Congress actually passed.”

The rule change is scheduled to take effect on Sept. 14. Two other ESA rollbacks would end automatic protections for newly listened threatened species (such as those on the brink of endangered status) and give more weight to economic factors when considering critical habitat designations.

A coalition of environmental groups filed a lawsuit earlier this month challenging the “harm” rule.”