Case Timeline
The Center suedthe Trump administration for failing to protect the West Coast ocean habitat of the last remaining Southern Resident killer whales. The Center suedthe Trump administration to expose a secretive program that denies Endangered Species Act safety to imperiled species like thePacific walrus. The lawsui follows controversy over the Species Status Assessment (SSA) program. Ryan Zinke and the Trump administration have denied protection to the walrus and are getting ready to strip safeguards from theCanada lynxandAmerican burying beetle. The Center and other conservation groups suedthe Trump administration for failing to think about protections for Africa’s quickly dwindlinggiraffepopulation beneath the Endangered Species Act.
The lawsuit seeks a court order to forestall St. Louis-based mostly Arch Coal from beginning exploratory drilling and highway construction as quickly as right now on pristine public lands on Colorado’s West Slope. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt for failing to enforce air-quality requirements that restrict lethal soot air pollution. The lawsuit seeks to drive the EPA to ensure that communities in California, Idaho and Pennsylvania are taking legally required steps to fulfill clean-air standards to scale back soot, also called nice particulate matter. The go well with was filed with fewer than 30 vaquitas remaining on the planet after their inhabitants suffered a 95 p.c decline over the past 20 years.
Interior Secretary David Bernhardt for failing to make safety choices for twenty-four species of animals and plants under the Endangered Species Act. The record of wildlife left with out safety contains the elfin-woods warbler, Franklin’s bumblebee and tricolored blackbird.
Fish and Wildlife Service’s refusal to act on anApril 2017 petitionseeking Endangered Species Act safety for giraffes. The Center and ally conservation teams filed alawsuitchallenging the Trump administration’s approval of the first offshore oil drilling growth in federal Arctic waters. Hilcorp Alaska received approval in October to build and operate the controversial Liberty project, a synthetic drilling island and underwater pipeline that dangers oil spills in the sensitive Beaufort Sea and threatens polar bears and Arctic communities. The Center and three other conservation teams filed alawsuitin federal district courtroom to overturn a key permit for the controversial proposed Rosemont Copper Mine in southern Arizona. Army Corps of Engineers’ issuance of a Clean Water Act permit for the mine, which would threaten critical water resources and wildlife habitat.
Fish and Wildlife Service’s illegal delay in deciding whether or not to extend Endangered Species Act protection to the San Joaquin Valley giant flower-loving fly. The hummingbird-like fly has been extirpated from greater than ninety nine % of its former vary, with only one remaining inhabitants about 15 miles east of Bakersfield, where it’s beneath immediate threat of extinction from sand mining. The Center and ally conservation teams filed alawsuitchallenging two rules that weaken Clean Water Act protections for rivers, streams, wetlands and different waterways, including a Trump administration decision to delay the 2015 Clean Water Rule for two years.
They are among hundreds of species awaiting choices about whether to be protected underneath the Endangered Species Act or to obtain protected important habitat. The Center for Biological Diversity filed 4 lawsuits at present challenging the Trump administration’s failure to launch a trove of documents detailing how the administration is regulating harmful pesticides, particularly as they relate to endangered species. The Center and ally conservation teams fileda lawsuitchallenging the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s failure to finalize endangered species protection and designate critical habitat for Southern Mountain caribou.
The Center and Maricopa Audubon filed alawsuitin federal district court to compel the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to expand important habitat for Arizona’s extremely endangered Mount Graham red squirrel.
Entanglement in fishing gillnets is the sole threat to the species survival. Scientists predict that the vaquita will be extinct by 2019 if fishing practices stay unchanged.
The lawsuit notes that each species have suffered dramatic declines due to overfishing — both via intentional targeting or from being killed by fishing gear aimed at different animals. The Center for Biological Diversitysuedthe Trump administration for failing to protect 12 coral species around Florida and islands within the Pacific Ocean. The corals all acquired Endangered Species Act safety in 2014, however they didn’t obtain the critical habitat protection the law requires. The Center for Biological Diversity and Healthy Gulf filed a lawsuit towards the Trump administration for failing to guard two species of map turtles beneath the Endangered Species Act.