US proposes eroding species protections

What happened

The Trump administration Wednesday proposed changing the definition of "harm" in the 1973 Environmental Protection Act to exclude damaging the habitats where endangered species live, siding with businesses who view the current longstanding definition as a burdensome regulation that limits logging, oil drilling, mining and housing development. Under the proposed new definition, harm would refer only to activities that deliberately kill or injure an endangered animal, like hunting or trapping.

Who said what

Narrowing the definition of "harm" to exclude habitat degradation "makes sense in light of the well-established, centuries-old understanding" of the word, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service said in their proposed rule.

Habitat loss is the "single biggest reason that many species face extinction," The New York Times said. The proposed change "cuts the heart out of the Endangered Species Act," said Noah Greenwald of the Center for Biological Diversity, per The Washington Post. Kristen Boyles, a lawyer at Earthjustice, called the new definition "nonsensical both legally and biologically," allowing "a developer to drain a pond where an endangered species of turtle or fish lived, and that wouldn't be harm."

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What next?

The public has 30 days to submit comments on the rule before it is finalized. Oil industry advocates applauded the proposal. Environmental groups vowed to challenge it in court, pointing out that the Supreme Court upheld the more expansive definition of "harm" in 1995.