Trump’s ESA rewrite leans on Scalia dissent as blueprint to shrink protections
The Trump administration is pushing to reinterpret the Endangered Species Act to limit protections to actions directly targeting individual animals, effectively de-emphasizing habitat modification and incidental deaths. An internal Fish and Wildlife Service memo directs staff to apply a narrow reading of “take,” drawing on a 1995 Scalia dissent that argued the ESA should protect animals’ breeding and habitat only in a limited way. This follows a previous rule change that removed habitat destruction from the definition of “harm” and could threaten entire populations by allowing incidental killings if not aimed at the animal. Environmentalists warn the move guts the act, while the administration defends it as enforcing the statute’s plain text amid ongoing litigation and shifts away from the Chevron doctrine.