In accordance with a settlement between the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), the FWS was required to make an Endangered Species Act (ESA) listing determination for the monarch butterfly by December 15, 2020. On December 17, 2020, the FWS announced that it had determined that adding the monarch butterfly to the list of threatened and endangered species is “warranted but precluded” by higher-priority listing actions.
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Continue Reading Fish and Wildlife Service Issues “Warranted but Precluded” Finding for Monarch Butterfly

In a case involving the question of when unoccupied habitat may be designated “critical habitat” under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the U.S. Supreme Court held that critical habitat land must first be habitat before it could be “critical habitat.” Weyerhaeuser Co. v. U.S. FWS, 139 S.Ct. 361 (2018). Given that neither the ESA nor its implementing regulations define habitat, the Court remanded the case for further consideration. In response to this opinion, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service (the Services) issued a final rule defining habitat on December 16, 2020. The rule becomes effective on January 15, 2021.
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Continue Reading Final Rule Defining “Habitat” under the Endangered Species Act Issued

In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Weyerhaeuser Co. v. U.S. FWS, 139 S.Ct. 361 (2018), the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has issued a series of proposals to refine the scope, meaning, and criteria for designating critical habitat for species listed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The most recent proposal will be published in the Federal Register on September 8, 2020, kicking off a 30-day public comment period.
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Continue Reading FWS Issues Additional Habitat Proposal

On January 30, 2020, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (“USFWS”) released its anticipated Migratory Bird Treaty Act (“MBTA”) proposed rule. The purpose of the proposed rule is to codify the December 2017 Department of Interior (“DOI”) Solicitor opinion (“M-Opinion”) limiting liability under the MBTA. The M-Opinion overturned an earlier Obama Administration M-Opinion explicitly finding that MBTA liability applied to incidental take.
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Continue Reading Trump Administration Releases Anticipated MBTA Proposed Rule

On January 28, in Center for Biological Diversity v. Everson, No. 1:15-cv-00477 (D.D.C. 2020), the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia remanded, but did not vacate, the United States Fish and Wildlife Services’ (“USFWS”) April 2015 decision to list the northern long-eared bat (“NLEB”) as threatened under the Endangered Species Act (“ESA”). The court also vacated a component of the USFWS and National Marine Fisheries Services (collectively, “Services”) significant portion of its range policy (the “SPR Policy”) regarding how to evaluate whether a species is endangered in a “significant portion of its range” once a determination has been made that the species is threatened throughout “all of its range.” The SPR Policy, issued in 2014, has formed the basis for other listing decisions and thus its vacatur has implications beyond the NLEB.
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Continue Reading Federal District Court Remands Northern-Long Eared Bat Listing Decision