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Climate
Trump Proposal to Weaken Endangered Species Act Will 'Accelerate the Extinction Crisis,' Green Groups Warn
The proposal "could seal the fate of animals that, without these protections, would disappear from the Earth," said the Sierra Club’s executive director.
Nov 19, 2025
Environmentalists are sounding the alarm about a slate of new proposals from the Trump administration to weaken the Endangered Species Act, which they say will put more imperiled species in danger to line the pockets of the wealthy.
On Wednesday, the Department of the Interior's Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announced that it would once again roll back several key provisions of the ESA. Many had been in place for decades before they were slashed during President Donald Trump's first term. They were then restored under former President Joe Biden.
"These revisions end years of legal confusion and regulatory overreach, delivering certainty to states, tribes, landowners, and businesses while ensuring conservation efforts remain grounded in sound science and common sense," said Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, a billionaire ally of the fossil fuel industry.
But some of the nation's leading environmental groups say the proposals will allow the government to flout science and approve new projects that will destroy the habitats of vulnerable creatures and accelerate the already worsening extinction crisis.
“The ESA is one of the world’s most powerful laws for conservation and is responsible for keeping 99% of listed species from extinction,” said Jane Davenport, senior attorney at Defenders of Wildlife.
The group said the changes "could accelerate the extinction crisis we face today." According to a 2023 investigation by the Montana Free Press, the ESA has prevented 291 species from going extinct since it was passed in 1973. At that point, around 40% of all animals and 34% of plants were considered at risk of extinction according to NatureServe, a nonprofit that collects conservation data.
“The ESA is only as effective as the regulations that implement it," Davenport said. “Rolling back these regulations risks reversing the ESA’s historic success and threatens the well-being of plant and animal species that pollinate our crops, generate medicine, keep our waterways clean, and support local economies.”
One of the rules being rolled back requires species to receive "blanket" protections when they are added to the list of threatened species. Instead of those blanket protections—which protect these newly-added species from killing, trapping, and other forms of harm—the FWS will instead create individual designations for each species.
According to Jackson Chiappinelli, a spokesperson for Earthjustice, some of the species that would lose protection under this rule would be the Florida manatee, California spotted owl, greater sage grouse, and monarch butterfly, which it said could remain unprotected for years after being listed.
Another major change would let the government consider "economic impacts" when deciding which habitats are required to be protected. In 1982, Congress modified the ESA to clarify that the secretary of the interior must make decisions "solely on the basis of the best scientific and commercial data available," an amendment specifically intended to prevent economic factors from overawing environmental concerns.
The Interior Department said "the revised framework provides transparency and predictability for landowners and project proponents while maintaining the service’s authority to ensure that exclusions will not result in species extinction."
But Chiappinelli contends that the change would "violate the letter of the law" and warns that "the federal government could decide against protecting an endangered species after considering lost revenue from prohibiting a golf course or hotel development to be built where the species lives."
"If finalized, the rules would bias listing decisions with unreliable economic analyses, obstruct the ability to list new protected species, and make it easier to remove those now on the federal endangered or threatened list," said Ian Brickey, a spokesperson for the Sierra Club.
The proposed rules would also reduce the requirements for other federal agencies to consult with wildlife agencies to determine whether their actions could harm critical habitats. It also eliminates the requirement for agencies to "offset" habitat damage when approving new projects, such as logging or drilling, that harm protected species.
“Without rigorous consultations,” Davenport said, “projects could push species like the northern spotted owl and Cook Inlet beluga whale closer to extinction.”
The new proposals follow several efforts by the Trump administration to weaken protections for endangered species. Earlier this year, it proposed weakening the half-century-old definition of what counts as "harm" to endangered species to exclude habitat destruction.
The Department of Agriculture, meanwhile, has proposed rescinding the 2001 "Roadless Rule," which has shielded nearly 45 million acres of protected national forest from logging, oil and gas drilling, and road construction.
Amid the government shutdown, the administration announced its intent to lay off more than 2,000 Interior Department employees, including 143 from the FWS, though a federal judge blocked those layoffs.
It also attempted to sneak a provision into July's One Big Beautiful Bill Act that would have mandated the sale of millions of acres of public lands, but it was stripped out in the Senate following fierce backlash.
"The Trump administration is stopping at nothing in its quest to put corporate polluters over people, wildlife and the environment," said Loren Blackford, the Sierra Club's executive director. "These regulations attempt to undermine the implementation of one of America’s bedrock environmental laws, and they could seal the fate of animals that, without these protections, would disappear from the Earth."
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Trump’s Climate Policies Could Cause Mass Death of Global Poor, Analysis Warns
"These are people with lives," said a spokesperson for the US Climate Action Network. "They are people like us, even if they happen to live in a different part of the world."
Nov 19, 2025
As he skips out on this year’s annual climate summit in Brazil to the chagrin of world leaders, a new analysis shows that President Donald Trump’s climate agenda will cause a massive increase in excess deaths in the poor nations least equipped to deal with—and least responsible for—rising temperatures.
The analysis, published Wednesday by The Guardian and ProPublica, found that the emissions released over the next decade due to Trump's acceleration of fossil fuel usage, combined with his killing of renewable energy, will result in an estimated 1.3 million more preventable heat-related deaths worldwide over the next 80 years.
Most of them will occur in poor, hot countries in Africa and South Asia, which the report notes "emitted relatively little of the pollution that causes climate change," but "are least prepared to cope with the increasing heat." On the contrary, the US, which has just 4% of the world's population, has emitted around 20% of the world's greenhouse gases.
The estimate of excess deaths is based on a widely recognized peer-reviewed metric known as the "mortality cost of carbon," which finds that every 4,434 metric tons of greenhouse gas released into the atmosphere translates to about one additional excess death. Notably, that metric only includes direct temperature-related deaths from conditions like heat stroke, while not taking into account indirect deaths from drought, famine, disease, wildfires, and other disasters that climate change is worsening.
An analysis from Carbon Brief, based on modeling from Princeton University, found that an additional 7 billion metric tonnes of carbon—roughly the equivalent of Indonesia, the world’s sixth-largest emitter—will be released through 2030 as a result of Trump’s policy actions. These have included the shredding of pollution regulations; the near-total elimination of investment in wind, solar, and electric vehicles; and the dramatic expansion of oil and coal extraction.
As the rest of the world makes great strides toward a renewable future, the global Climate Action Tracker says Trump is carrying out “the most aggressive, comprehensive, and consequential climate policy rollback” it has ever analyzed.
"We are quickly emerging as the planet’s rogue nation, determined to deny climate and slow the energy transition as best we can," wrote environmental journalist Bill McKibben last month in Common Dreams.
The new analysis follows research published last month by the University College of London, which found that the climate crisis has already led to a huge spike in excess deaths. An average of more than half a million preventable heat-related deaths occurred globally each year between 2012 and 2021, a 23% increase since the 1990s.
While still an unfathomable loss of life, the 1.3 million projected to die as a result of Trump's climate policies are a drop in the bucket on top of the 83 million excess deaths that the mortality metric predicts if emissions continue at the same rate.
“The sheer numbers are horrifying,” Ife Kilimanjaro, executive director of the non-profit US Climate Action Network, told The Guardian and ProPublica. "But for us, they’re more than numbers. These are people with lives, with families, with hopes and dreams. They are people like us, even if they happen to live in a different part of the world."
The report comes amid the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) in Belém, Brazil, which the US was one of only four nations in the world to skip, drawing condemnation from numerous world leaders.
One of them was Maina Vakafua Talia, the climate envoy from Tuvalu, the small Pacific island nation that is expected to be one of the first countries to become uninhabitable due to sea level rise and fiercer storms, and has already begun planning for mass evacuations over the next two decades. Trump's pullout from the Paris Climate Accords, he said, demonstrated a “shameful disregard for the rest of the world."
But while the brunt of the climate emergency will be felt by the Global South, Americans will not be spared. Annual deaths from heat in the US have already increased by 50% since the year 2000, according to a recent Yale University study. A Texas A&M University study from 2023 projected that if global temperatures exceed 3°C above preindustrial levels, an additional 200,000 Americans could die annually due to changes that cause both hot and cold temperatures to become more extreme.
In an interview at COP30 with Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, Dutch climate envoy Prince Jaime de Bourbon de Parme likened Trump's denial of the climate emergency to ignoring an illness.
"If I’m sick, and I take my temperature, and I’ve got facts and figures that I’m sick, I can ignore it or not," he said. "So, it’s up to him to listen to the doctor or not. But it’s wise to listen to the facts. The science tells the story. I’m not telling it. It’s not my opinion. It’s just listening to the experts that tell us that climate is a fact."
The Guardian and ProPublica analysis came a day after the Brazilian COP30 Presidency released a draft text that campaigners warned did not go far enough in demanding a roadmap to transitioning away from fossil fuels. More than 80 countries at the conference on Tuesday joined a call for leaders to include tangible metrics and plans for the transition in the summit's final agreement.
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Groups Condemn 'Exceptionally Weak' Language on Fossil Fuel Phaseout in COP30 Draft Text
"A roadmap for delivering on 1.5°C without a credible fossil fuel phaseout at its core is hollow," said one campaigner.
Nov 18, 2025
Climate justice organizers on Tuesday expressed some cautious optimism that a draft text out of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Belém, Brazil contained "building blocks" of a climate justice package that is needed to draw down planet-heating fossil fuel emissions and help the poorest and least-polluting countries confront the climate emergency—but advocates said that with just three days to go until the summit is over, the document still falls far short of delivering solutions.
The draft text, released by COP30 President André Corrêa do Lago, includes references to a "transition away from fossil fuels," and calls for annual reviews of countries' Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), the efforts they pledge to make to reduce their emissions.
But a day after campaigners expressed optimism about 62 countries and country groups endorsing Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's call for a Transition Away From Fossil Fuels (TAFF) Roadmap, 350.org condemned the draft text for mentioning the roadmap only in paragraph 44—and excluding a fossil fuel phaseout from that section of the proposal.
The TAFF Roadmap, according to the draft, would recognize that "finance, capacity-building, and technology transfer are critical enablers of climate action."
The text also calls for "a high-level ministerial roundtable" where countries would discuss national circumstances, pathways to limiting planetary heating to 1.5°C over preindustrial temperatures, and approaches to supporting government in developing just transition roadmaps, "including to progressively overcome their dependency on fossil fuels and towards halting and reversing deforestation."
But 350.org condemned that call as an "exceptionally weak," sole reference to a fossil fuel transition, warning that "a mandated ministerial and a report... offer symbolism, not action."
"For the decision to carry credibility, the presidency must embed a fossil fuel transition roadmap directly into the 1.5°C response, not relegate it to the margins," said the group in its analysis of the document. "The roadmap must be placed in the section addressing the 1.5°C ambition gap, where it is currently absent."
Andreas Sieber, associate director of policy and campaigns for 350.org, said that "the draft text may contain the right ingredients, but it’s been assembled in a way that leaves a bitter aftertaste."
"For the decision to carry credibility, the presidency must embed a fossil fuel transition roadmap directly into the 1.5°C response, not relegate it to the margins. The roadmap must be placed in the section addressing the 1.5°C ambition gap, where it is currently absent."
"A roadmap for delivering on 1.5°C without a credible fossil fuel phaseout at its core is hollow. The COP30 presidency must heed the many parties, including President Lula, calling for a clear transition pathway and put it where it belongs: at the center of the 1.5°C response, balanced with adequate finance," said Sieber. "Without this, the overall effort will fall short.”
The group emphasized that a credible COP30 final text will include "a balanced package that delivers climate finance, strengthened adaptation measures, and a clear road map for phasing out fossil fuels."
"Without all three pillars in place, a durable and effective agreement will not be possible," said 350.org
The text mentions climate finance 26 times, the Guardian reported, and urges wealthy countries to clearly lay out their plans to provide financial assistance to the Global South—at a ministerial roundtable in one option included in the document, or through a "Belém Global De-Risking and Project Preparation and Development Facility," which would "catalyze climate finance and implementation in developing country parties by translating Nationally Determined Contributions and national adaptation plans into project pipelines."
But 350.org noted that pledges made to a global adaptation fund on Monday "once again fell short with only $133 million secured out of the $300 million target."
Fanny Petitbon, France team lead for 350.org, warned that "adaptation has long been forgotten in climate finance," and called on the presidency to ensure it has a central role in the final text.
"Crucially, the call to triple adaptation finance must stay," said Petitbon. "There is no credible ambition without supporting communities already facing the devastating impacts of the climate emergency. The presidency has begun to respond to strong demands for developed countries to pay their climate debt, which is key for rebuilding trust in all negotiating rooms."
"But the text still lacks a plan to fully deliver on the collective climate finance goal agreed upon in Baku [at COP29]—ignoring innovative sources of finance like taxing major polluters and the superrich," Petitibon added, "and fails to guarantee direct access for the most vulnerable, including Indigenous peoples."
At Oil Change International, global policy leader Romain Ioualalen said the options related to fossil fuels presented in the draft were "wildly unacceptable and a blatant dereliction of duty while the world burns."
"We don’t need a COP decision to convene a workshop or ministerial roundtable on fossil fuels. What we need is a clear collective direction of travel on how countries intend to phase out fossil fuels based on equity, and how rich Global North countries will provide finance and support to the countries that need it," said Ioualalen.
"Ministers must fix this mess," he added, "and deliver the progress that we need to make the fair and funded transition away from fossil fuels they promised in Dubai [at COP28] a reality.”
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Trump EPA's Rollback of Wetlands Protections Is Latest 'Gift' to Polluters, Groups Say
"Eliminating protections from small streams and wetlands will mean more pollution downstream—in our drinking water, at our beaches, and in our rivers," said one advocate.
Nov 18, 2025
Environmental justice campaigners on Monday said the Trump administration's latest rollback of wetland protections was "a gift to developers and polluters at the expense of communities" and demanded permanent protections for waterways.
“Clean water protections shouldn’t change with each administration,” said Betsy Southerland, former director of the Office of Science and Technology in the US Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Water. “Every family deserves the same right to safe water, no matter where they live or who’s in office.”
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin proposed changes to the rule known as "Waters of the United States" (WOTUS), which has been the subject of debate and legal challenges in recent decades. Under the Trump administration, as in President Donald Trump's first term, the EPA will focus on regulating permanent bodies of water like oceans, lakes, rivers, and streams.
The administration would more closely follow a 2023 Supreme Court decision, Sackett v. EPA, which the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) found this year would remove federal protections from 60-95% of wetlands across the nation.
The Zeldin rule would eliminate protections for most wetlands without visible surface water, going even further than Sackett v. EPA in codifying a narrower definition of wetlands that should be protected, said the Environmental Protection Network (EPN). The rule comes after pressure from industry groups that have bristled over past requirements to protect all waterways.
Wetlands provide critical wildlife habitats, replenish groundwater, control flooding, and protect clean water by filtering pollution.
The Biden administration required the Clean Water Act to protect “traditional navigable waters, the territorial seas, interstate waters, as well as upstream water resources that significantly affect those waters," but was constrained by the Sackett ruling in 2023.
“This proposed rule is unnecessary and damaging, and ignores the scientific reality of what is happening to our nation’s water supply."
Tarah Heinzen, legal director for Food and Water Watch, said the new rule "weakens the bedrock Clean Water Act, making it easier to fill, drain, and pollute sensitive waterways from coast to coast."
“Clean water is under attack in America, as polluting profiteers plunder our waters—Trump’s EPA is openly aiding and abetting this destruction," said Heinzen. “This rule flies in the face of science and commonsense. Eliminating protections from small streams and wetlands will mean more pollution downstream—in our drinking water, at our beaches, and in our rivers."
The "critical functions" of wetlands, she added, "will only become more important as worsening climate change makes extreme weather more frequent. EPA must reverse course."
Leda Huta, vice president of government relations for American Rivers, added that the change to WOTUS will "likely make things worse for flood-prone communities and industries dependent on clean, reliable water."
“This proposed rule is unnecessary and damaging, and ignores the scientific reality of what is happening to our nation’s water supply,” said Huta. "The EPA is taking a big swipe at the Clean Water Act, our greatest tool for ensuring clean water nationwide.”
The proposal was applauded by the National Association of Manufacturers, whose president, Jay Timmins, said companies' "ability to invest and build across the country" has been "undermined" by the Obama and Biden administration's broader interpretation of WOTUS.
But Southerland said Zeldin's proposal "ignores decades of science showing that wetlands and intermittent streams are essential to maintaining the health of our rivers, lakes, and drinking water supplies."
“This is one of the most significant setbacks to clean water protections in half a century,” she said. "It’s a direct assault on the clean water Americans rely on.”
Drew Caputo, vice president of litigation for lands, wildlife, and oceans at Earthjustice, said the group was evaluating the legality of the proposal and would "not hesitate to go to court to protect the cherished rivers, lakes, streams, and wetlands that all Americans need and depend on.”
"The proposal avoids specifying the exact scale of the deregulation it proposes, but it clearly would result in a serious reduction in legal protections for waters across the United States," said Caputo. "Many waters that have been protected by the Clean Water Act for over 50 years would lose those protections under this proposal."
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