Trump is gutting the Endangered Species Act. These 10 species show what’s at stake.

The Supreme Court once billed the Endangered Species Act as “the most comprehensive legislation for the preservation of endangered species ever enacted by any nation.” Federal protections have been key to saving nearly 300 U.S. species — including the bald eagle, American alligator, and grizzly bear — from permanent extinction. Each year, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is primarily responsible for implementing the law, evaluates species and lists them as “endangered” or “threatened.” When federal activity or private development has the potential to harm a listed species or its habitat, project developers are required to consult with the Service or obtain a permit prior to construction. For the last several decades, the interpretation of two words in particular — “take” and “harm” — have formed the backbone of the Nixon-era law. Its prohibition of “taking” an animal criminalized any attempts to “harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, or collect” at-risk species. And the provision on “harm” ensured that degrading a listed species’ habitat could be penalized. These definitions have been key to the success of the law. But that all changed last month when the Trump administration determined that razing the habitat where endangered or threatened species breed, feed, and shelter would no longer face federal penalties. In a separate internal memo, the administration also reinterpreted the definition of “take,” limiting it to instances of intentional killing of an endangered species. (Nearly two dozen attorneys general have sued over some of these changes.) “These rule changes, when you zoom out, are an assault on threatened and endangered species unlike we’ve ever seen before,” said Elizabeth Forsyth, a senior attorney in the biodiversity defense program with Earthjustice, a nonprofit environmental law organization. “It’s an effort to eliminate habitat protections, eliminate automatic protections for threatened species, and give industry power.” Climate change is making matters worse, as species struggle to adapt to warming temperatures and changing ecosystems. Below, Grist reporters look at how 10 species — from lovable sea otters to a misunderstood snake — might fare as the regulatory framework that has kept them afloat is weakened. A North Atlantic right whale and calf swim about 19 nautical miles off Little St. Simons Island, Georgia, in 2025. Clearwater Marine Aquarium Research Institute / NOAA permit 26919 North Atlantic right whale North Atlantic right whales got their name perversely. Because they stick close to shore and to the surface, and float when killed, they were the “right whale” to hunt. So right that humans hunted them nearly to extinction before the practice was banned in the 1930s. That’s not why right whales are dying today. “Nobody goes out and says, ‘I’m gonna hit a right whale with my ship,’” said Delcianna Winders, director of the Animal Law and Policy Institute at Vermont Law and Graduate School. But it happens anyway. Though it’s not always possible to determine the cause of death for a whale, research shows that the leading cause is human activity: Ships strike the whales and fishing gear ensnares them, leading to injury and death. It happens often enough that North Atlantic right whales have been experiencing an unusual mortality event since 2017, in which 43 have died and 133 have been spotted injured or in poor health. About 380 whales remain, only 70 of whom are breeding females. A dead 1-year-old female North Atlantic right whale calf rests on a beach in Savannah, Georgia. Experts found evidence of blunt force trauma consistent with a vessel strike. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation / NOAA permit 24359 Well before the latest changes to the Endangered Species Act, the Trump administration had already begun rolling back protections for right whales. In March, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced plans to rescind ocean speed restrictions designed to reduce the risk of vessel strikes. The agency later declined to expand the whales’ designated critical habitat to include their migratory route. The administration will likely use its new definition of “take” to bolster those actions, Winders said. “Now they can point to this and say, ‘Look, we can’t have speed limits under the law because it only applies to intentional direct activities.’” Right whales are “particularly vulnerable” to the changes, Winders said, both because of their critically low population figures and because their primary causes of death are incidental takes. “Right whales don’t have two years or four years” to wait for a new president or Congress to restore their protections, Winders said. “This is going to impact them immediately.” — Emily Jones An eastern massasauga rattlesnake crawls over moss and grass. Nathan Rathbun / USFWS Eastern massasauga rattlesnake Admirers of the only venomous snake species in Michigan call the creature misunderstood. The eastern massasauga rattlesnake — which grows up to 3 feet long, with a rattle at the end of its sandy, brown-speckled body — is often vilified in rare accounts of snake bites and has been the subject of state advisories to stop harassing the animal. These snakes are actually “very shy, pretty calm,” said Adam Austin, a wildlife biologist who leads the conservation nonprofit Midwest Friends of Wildlife. They prefer to hide in the wetlands that they call home, and their name is a nod to their swampy abodes; massasauga means “great river mouth” in Anishinaabemowin, the Indigenous language spoken across the Great Lakes. In recent years, as wetland acreage has shrunk across the Midwest — due to development, drainage, and climate change — the massasauga’s habitats have become fragmented. The resulting isolation makes it difficult for them to breed with other populations, diminishing genetic diversity and leaving them less resistant to new diseases. More than a third of the roughly 260 sites where the snake has been surveyed across the Midwest are at risk of habitat loss, according to the Fish and Wildlife Service. As a result, federal officials listed the snake as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in 2016. The move has helped conserve millions of acres of wetlands in the region, Austin said, but recent changes to federal protections are likely to spell trouble for the rattlesnake. Signs mark the location for oil pipeline construction in Howell, Michigan, part of the documented territory for the eastern massasauga rattlesnake. Jim West / UCG / Universal Images Group via Getty Images Snake advocates worry that under the Trump administration, razing wetlands the massasauga roam in or accidentally killing them during construction may not be a violation of federal law. While Michigan has its own endangered species laws — eastern massasaugas are considered state-threatened — protections are narrower than the federal Endangered Species Act. The state also has strong legal protections for wetlands, but the loss of a federal backstop could shift more responsibility to the state to fill regulatory gaps, said Tara Zuardo, a senior advocate with the Center for Biological Diversity. “Michigan’s law and the federal Endangered Species Act would suddenly be operating under the same words, but radically different legal meanings,” Zuardo said. — Vivian La A bull trout swims over an antler in a stream in northwest Montana. Jim Mogen / USFWS Bull trout Bull trout, native to Montana and recognizable by their large heads and white-tipped fins, are the alpine equivalent of a canary in a coal mine. They rely on cold, clean water, and as warmer temperatures, invasive species, and sediment runoff have degraded their habitat, Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, the state’s wildlife management agency, has documented significant declines across half of the population. Road construction, particularly for industrial logging, poses one of the greatest threats to bull trout spawning habitat. The fish are particularly sensitive to sediment buildup, which can coat the gravelly bottom of a river and smother their eggs. “I could list off 10 streams right now that 15, 20 years ago had bull trout in them, and they don’t anymore,” said Brian Riggers, a retired fisheries biologist with the U.S. Forest Service who spent decades documenting bull trout in streams across western Montana. “That’s a sad thing.” Bull trout are listed as “threatened” by the Fish and Wildlife Service in recognition that they’re likely to become endangered and at risk of extinction without protection. The listing ensures that anglers are not allowed to catch and release them like other species of trout, and it’s not legal to fish for them in most of their habitat. Biologists measure a bull trout as part of a species survey. Shannon Downey / USFWS The Trump administration’s proposed policy changes to weaken the Endangered Species Act, as well as rescind protections for roadless areas in national forests and allow more motorized recreation, are the latest blows to these imperiled fish. Riggers said that without protections for their remaining habitat, bull trout will continue to face steep declines. The need to preserve their habitat has been a key component of legal challenges against large-scale logging projects in the state. Without the explicit federal protections to prevent harm to a listed species’ habitat, it could become nearly impossible to stop development projects that degrade spawning streams and block the bull trout’s ability to move through rivers. — Ellis Juhlin A Florida panther, captured by the Fish and Wildlife Service. Larry W. Richardson / USFWS Florida panther Florida panthers once roamed much of the American Southeast. But then settlers arrived and hunted them until just a few dozen remained. Their range dwindled to a small area in southern Florida — a state that, until 1950, paid a $5 bounty to any hunter who turned in a panther scalp. Today, the panthers, among the first species protected by the Endangered Species Act, are recovering, with an estimated 200 thought to live in the state. “It’s been a tremendous effort over the years,” said Elizabeth Fleming, a career expert on the species at Defenders of Wildlife, a conservation nonprofit that helps protect panthers. Because most Floridians haven’t lived with panthers for more than a century, recovery depends on helping people coexist with them as they spread, often through educational programs or compensating ranchers who lose livestock to panthers. Without public acceptance, “we can kiss panthers goodbye,” she said. But now, nearly 60 years after panthers were first federally protected, the Trump administration’s new interpretation of the law could undermine this progress. Florida panther kittens as seen in their den. David Shindle / Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission This is particularly worrisome for Florida panthers, which were listed in the law’s early days and don’t have the additional habitat protections that became mandatory later on. Florida’s population is also booming faster than nearly any other state. That means more housing developments and highways that fragment panther habitat, and more traffic that can kill them. Vehicle collisions are the leading cause of panther deaths, Fleming said. One of the most quickly developing parts of the state directly abuts its only panther refuge. Under the new federal rules, developers may no longer need to contend with how their projects could harm panthers. “People don’t understand that these animals need so much more,” Fleming said. “They need a connected system in which to travel and live their lives, and with every single instance of weakened laws, regulations, and protections, it’s just another thing going against them.” — Sachi Mulkey Southern sea otters play and groom at Moss Landing, Monterey, California. Lilian Carswell / USFWS California sea otter Thousands of sea otters spend their lives weaving through the towering emerald ribbons of kelp forest found around California’s central coast. Lucky kayakers might spot one taking a moment to float belly-up, perhaps cracking open a tasty sea urchin with its favorite rock. They also rest this way when they sleep, sometimes holding hands to stay together while trusting their ultra-buoyant and water-resistant fur to keep them above the waves. These lovable marine mammals were once thought to be extinct in California, after intensive pelt hunting in the 19th and 18th centuries culled their population down from some 16,000 individuals. But a small number of otters survived and repopulated. Today, some 3,000 otters live in the Big Sur region, just south of San Francisco. That recovery was largely possible through Endangered Species Act protections that the Trump administration has repeatedly weakened. The latest changes, which gut habitat protections, could leave sea otters especially at risk. Much like the Florida panther, they also do not have a “critical habitat designation,” an additional safeguard that only became mandatory after sea otters were already added to the list. When it comes to protecting otters, habitat is everything, said Sean Bothwell, the executive director of the California Coastkeeper Alliance. In the past, conservationists rallied to fight against oil spills in otter habitat. Today, they’re turning their attention to fertilizers used for farming, which can cause algae blooms and make the shellfish that otters eat toxic. “We’re so concerned about otters because they live in the tidal zone; they are directly impacted by anything that runs off of the land,” he said. A raft of sea otters feeds near Pleasure Point in Santa Cruz, California, in 2023. Nic Coury / AFP via Getty Images The Trump administration’s changes to habitat protections will make it much harder to hold companies accountable for this kind of pollution, Bothwell said. His organization recently decided to pause a lawsuit against a dam that was threatening a number of endangered species, like fish and toads, because the case partly rested on the legal definition of “harming” an animal that the administration rescinded this summer. Without these safeguards, he said, lawsuits that focus on habitat protections could lose their teeth. “We are worried there will be some kind of backsliding,” Bothwell said. — Sachi Mulkey The rusty patched bumble bee was listed as an endangered species in 2017, making it the first bumble bee to receive federal protection. Native wildflowers are the best sources of pollen and nectar, like this bergamot flower. Mara Koenig / USFWS Rusty patched bumble bee Like the nearly 50 other bumble bees native to North America, the rusty patched bumble bee is a fuzzy, mostly yellow-and-black insect that buzzes between plants gathering nectar and pollen. Unlike its cousins, and as its name suggests, the rare bee sports a distinctive amber spot near the middle of its back. When Libby Shafer, now an urban ecologist and PhD Candidate in plant biology at Northwestern University, was a biological technician with the United States Geological Survey and tried to track down the bee over the course of a three-month search that spanned Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin, she had very little luck. “I personally only saw one,” she said. The bee, once common in 28 states including Illinois and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec, has declined by nearly 90 percent over the past 30 years. Today, it occupies just 0.1 percent of its historic range. The pollinator was listed as federally endangered in 2017, becoming the first bee species listed under the Endangered Species Act. Experts have pointed to a number of stressors that explain the bees’ dramatic decline, including habitat loss, pesticide use, disease, and climate change. For example, warmer temperatures can set off a mismatch between when bees emerge from hibernation and when native plants bloom and provide food. This past summer, conservationists celebrated the Fish and Wildlife Service’s designation of approximately 1.5 million acres of occupied critical habitat for the rusty patched bumble bee, which protects it from projects funded or permitted by federal agencies but not from private landowners — approximately 83 percent of the bees’ critical habitat is privately held. “The rusty patched bumble bee is better positioned than many listed species since critical habitat has finally been designated,” said Delcianna Winders, of the Animal Law and Policy Institute at Vermont Law and Graduate School. But she added that the Trump administration’s rescission of the regulatory definition of “harm” to exclude habitat destruction and reinterpretation of “take” pose serious threats to the species. Bumblebees are small, can easily go unnoticed, and spend about half the year in the soil, making them difficult to spot for an expert, let alone a developer building a service road over a prairie. “This is bad news for the rusty patched bumble bee,” Schafer said. — Juanpablo Ramirez-Franco A biologist holds an Eastern hellbender, which can grow up to two and a half feet. USFWS Eastern hellbender Wildlife advocates with the Center for Biological Diversity and other organizations have been trying to get the eastern hellbender listed for more than a decade. In 2024, they came close. After Hurricane Helene felled trees and kicked up sediment, disturbing the sensitive salamander’s habitat, the Fish and Wildlife Service finally proposed the hellbender for protection, with a decision expected at the end of 2025. But the decision never came. In fact, not a single endangered species has been listed since Trump took office. The eastern hellbender has enjoyed state protection in places like New York and North Carolina. However, unlike other species that have been federally designated as “endangered” or “threatened,” the hellbender has had no federal protection, even as its population has dwindled dramatically. The salamander is a homebody — once it finds a place it likes to live, it often stays there its entire life. An ancient remnant of the Ice Age, it has lived in the same streams and rivers for just about 160 million years and has been called a living fossil. According to the Fish and Wildlife Service, its roughly 600 known historical populations have endured narrowing margins over the past few decades. More than 40 percent of those populations have vanished, and another 36 percent are in active decline. The hellbender breathes through its skin, meaning water pollution and sedimentation can cause disease and death. It thrives best in the cold, clear streams of the higher mountains in the Appalachian region, and shade cover is vital. Read Next The Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit in February, demanding the Fish and Wildlife Service complete its decisionmaking process. Since then, though, there’s been no movement, with the next regulatory step listed as “to be determined,” along with hundreds of other endangered species whose protections have been similarly delayed. According to Michael Gangloff, who studies freshwater life at Appalachian State University, human development is the biggest threat to hellbenders. But, he said, they’re also fighters. “These things are tough, and the fact that they’re still here attests to their toughness,” he said. “They’re an ancient, ancient group of salamanders.” — Katie Myers A red-cockaded woodpecker feasts on a bug. USFWS Red-cockaded woodpecker The southeastern United States used to be a red-cockaded woodpecker’s paradise, with longleaf pine forest stretching across much of the region. Unlike many other woodpeckers that hollow out dead trees to nest, these black-and-white-spotted birds live exclusively in the trunks of living pine trees. They spend months or years hollowing out a suitable cavity, and they prefer to do it in mature trees. But finding suitable trees has become much harder than it was a century ago. Much of the South’s longleaf pine forest was clear-cut for timber and replaced by faster-growing species of pine. Management practices vary, but commercial timber operations often cut and replant pines before the trees are mature enough for a red-cockaded woodpecker’s liking, according to Joe Burnham, a wildlife biologist with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources. “They have pretty specific habitat requirements,” Burnham said. “There are a whole suite of species, both plant and animal, that evolved with this ecosystem over time that really have a hard time surviving elsewhere.” Development is booming in Georgia, with much of the state’s forested land at risk of conversion to housing or more profitable forms of agriculture. The Trump administration’s policy changes, particularly its new definition of “harm,” could put red-cockaded woodpeckers at greater risk by removing protections for their habitat. As a result, more forests could become vulnerable to conversion, further shrinking the mature pine forests they rely on. Still, red-cockaded woodpeckers have made substantial strides since their 1973 Endangered Species Act listing, thanks in large part to efforts to restore longleaf pine habitat and transplant birds to suitable forests so they can reestablish themselves. In 2024, the federal Fish and Wildlife Service downlisted them from endangered to threatened. Despite the change, state- and region-level restoration efforts continue, Burnham said, because the woodpeckers need them — as do the long list of other endangered and threatened species that rely on the same habitat, including gopher tortoises and indigo snakes. “We’re managing these stands for a multitude of species,” he said. “We’ve invested a lot of conservation effort into these species.” — Emily Jones The palila, seen here at the Maui Bird Recovery Project, is endangered and endemic to Hawaiʻi, found only in the wild on the slopes of the Mauna Kea volcano. Eric J. Franke / The Washington Post via Getty Images Palila Hawaiʻi is losing its lush and unique biodiversity at a rate seen hardly anywhere else, earning it the depressing distinction of being known as the “extinction capital of the world.” It may be no surprise, then, that the palila — a small, yellow-capped parrot native to the Big Island — is a poster child of the Endangered Species Act. The palila was on the very first list of animals that the federal law protected. But conservationists soon discovered that protecting the bird itself was not enough; goats and sheep released on the island were denuding the high-elevation māmane forest that the parrot lives in. When they took the issue to court in 1979, federal courts agreed that allowing the palila’s habitat to be damaged was a violation of the Endangered Species Act and ordered the state to protect the forest from sheep and goats. The decision set a historic precedent and led to habitat protections for listed animals from industries — like mining, logging, and farming — across the United States. (The Supreme Court later cemented these protections.) A biologist with the Fish and Wildlife Service conducts a palila survey on Mauna Kea, Hawaiʻi. Emily Long / Mauna Kea Forest Restoration Project / USFWS But the Trump administration is now upending the legal precedent that the palila once set. The court decisions meant that the Hawaiʻi government had an obligation to continually remove the feral sheep and goats that still roam in palila habitat. When a company or the state wants to build through these areas, it is often required to help offset that lost habitat by reforesting old ranch land with māmane trees. Under the Trump administration’s interpretations, however, damaging an animal’s habitat no longer counts as harming it. And killing an animal no longer counts as violating the law unless it was done on purpose. That means, in the administration’s view, it may now be legal to build a road through māmane forest without considering how it affects palilas. And the state may no longer be required to continue eradicating the remaining feral sheep and goats, which would hasten the bird’s demise. Only 600 palila still remain on the island. For a bird on the brink, the latest policy changes may accelerate its decline. — Sachi Mulkey A Chinook salmon migrates up Alaska’s Ship Creek in the company of pink, chum and silver salmon. Katrina Mueller / USFWS Chinook salmon Every year, across Washington’s rivers and tributaries, hundreds of thousands of Chinook salmon sacrifice their lives for the next generation. They swim upstream for weeks, battling currents, starvation, and a flood of hormones that wreck their organs. Then they spawn — often in the river where they were born — and die. The completion of this journey is critical for tribal communities, commercial fisheries, and the wildlife of the Pacific Northwest that depend on salmon. But in the last century, salmon populations have plummeted. Humans have built dams and developed the land, degrading river ecosystems and blocking salmon from migrating. And recently, Washington has become the epicenter of another threat: 6PPD, a chemical used in vehicle tires that washes off roads into waterways and harms several fish species, including Chinook salmon. The Endangered Species Act protects several area-specific populations of salmon found in Washington’s rivers, like Chinook, coho, sockeye, and chum. Environmental advocates have had success leveraging the law to protect these habitats. Dozens of dams in Washington and other Pacific Northwest states have recently been removed, and salmon populations seem to be bouncing back quickly as a result. But this recovery is still nascent and, as the Trump administration upends federal protections, it may be cut short. The government recently rescinded the law’s “harm” rule, which previously said modifying a habitat could be considered harming a species. Now, it only prohibits activities that kill salmon on purpose. Read Next The change could devastate efforts to protect salmon, said Sean Bothwell, the executive director of the California Coastkeeper Alliance. His organization recently began tackling 6PPD contamination in Northern California, but has had to pause these efforts because their legal strategy relied on the rescinded “harm” rule. The change may also mean dam operators can no longer be pressured to maintain adequate flows for salmon, a particular concern as climate change makes downstream areas too warm for spawning. “People aren’t going out there and stabbing salmon, but they are putting a chemical into the habitat that is directly killing them” or modifying their habitat by blocking the flow of rivers, Bothwell said. “That’s why this rule was so important.” — Sachi Mulkey Editor’s note: Earthjustice is an advertiser with Grist. Advertisers have no role in Grist’s editorial decisions.