Proposed rule change on endangered species triggers alarm for environmentalists

The Trump administration plans to eliminate habitat protections for endangered and threatened species in a move environmentalists say would lead to the extinction of critically endangered species because of logging, mining, development and other activities.

At issue is a long-standing definition of “harm” in the Endangered Species Act, which has included altering or destroying the places those species live. Habitat destruction is the biggest cause of extinction, said Noah Greenwald, endangered species director at the Center for Biological Diversity.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service said in a proposed rule issued Wednesday that habitat modification should not be considered harm because it is not the same as intentionally targeting a species, called “take.” Environmentalists argue that the definition of “take,” though, has always included actions that harm species, and the definition of “harm” has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The proposed rule “cuts the heart out of the Endangered Species Act,” Greenwald said. “If (you) say harm doesn’t mean significant habitat degradation or modification, then it really leaves endangered species out in the cold.”

For example, he said spotted owls and Florida panthers both are protected because the current rule forbids habitat destruction. But if the new rule is adopted, someone who logs in a forest or builds a development would be unimpeded as long as they could say they didn't intend to harm an endangered species, he said.

The proposed rule was expected to be published in the Federal Register on Thursday, kicking off a 30-day public comment period.

A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spokeswoman referred The Associated Press to the Department of Interior, which declined to comment.

Environmental groups will challenge the rule in court if it is adopted, said Drew Caputo, an attorney at Earthjustice.

He said the proposal “threatens a half-century of progress in protecting and restoring endangered species,” including bald eagles, gray wolves, Florida manatees and humpback whales. He said that is because the current rule “recognizes the common-sense concept that destroying a forest, beach, river, or wetland that a species relies on for survival constitutes harm to that species.”

The question is whether the Trump administration is entitled to repeal a rule that was upheld specifically by the Supreme Court and therefore subject to precedent, said Patrick Parenteau, an emeritus professor at the Vermont Law and Graduate School who has handled endangered species cases.

Because of the current definition of harm, “many, many millions of acres of land has been conserved” to help keep species alive, he said.

The issue is of particular concern in Hawaii. The islands have more endangered species than any other state — 40% of the nation’s federally listed threatened and endangered species — even though Hawaii has less than 1% of the land area, according to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.

Maxx Philipps, Hawaii and Pacific Islands director for the Center for Biological Diversity, said removing these safeguards will accelerate Hawaii’s extinction crisis and erode the biological and cultural heritage of the islands.

She pointed to the example of tiny native bees that forage on and pollinate coastal dune plants. Very little oceanfront property remains undeveloped and what is left tends to be fragmented pockets. Other listed species living on the shoreline — like green sea turtles –- could also lose their homes if protections are removed.

“Habitat is life, right?" she said. "And without it, there is no recovery and without recovery, there is only extinction.”

Associated Press writer Audrey McAvoy in Hawaii contributed to this report.

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FILE - A baby manatee swimming beside its mother comes to the surface to breathe, at Manatee Lagoon, in Riviera Beach, Fla., Jan. 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File)

FILE - Cut down trees are visible at the site of a timber sale in the Tahoe National Forest, June 6, 2023, near Camptonville, Calif. (AP Photo/Godofredo A. Vásquez, File)

FILE - A pair of bald eagles call out while resting on a tree next to Union Bay, Jan. 16, 2024, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson, File)

BERLIN (AP) — European leaders are expected to cement support for Ukraine Monday as it faces Washington’s pressure to swiftly accept a U.S.-brokered peace deal.

After Sunday’s talks in Berlin between U.S. envoys and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukrainian and European officials are set to continue a series of meetings in an effort to secure the continent’s peace and security in the face of an increasingly assertive Russia.

Zelenskyy sat down Sunday with U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner in the German federal chancellery in the hopes of bringing the nearly four-year war to a close.

Washington has tried for months to navigate the demands of each side as Trump presses for a swift end to Russia’s war and grows increasingly exasperated by delays. The search for possible compromises has run into major obstacles, including control of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, which is mostly occupied by Russian forces.

The U.S. government late Sunday said in a social media post on Witkoff’s account after the five-hour meeting that “a lot of progress was made.”

Earlier in the day, Zelenskyy voiced readiness to drop his country’s bid to join NATO if the U.S. and other Western nations give Kyiv security guarantees similar to those offered to NATO members. But Ukraine continued to reject the U.S. push for ceding territory to Russia.

Putin wants Ukraine to withdraw its forces from the part of the Donetsk region still under its control among the key conditions for peace.

The Russian president also has cast Ukraine’s bid to join NATO as a major threat to Moscow’s security and a reason for launching the full-scale invasion in February 2022. The Kremlin has demanded that Ukraine renounce the bid for alliance membership as part of any prospective peace settlement.

Zelenskyy emphasized that any Western security assurances would need to be legally binding and supported by the U.S. Congress.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who has spearheaded European efforts to support Ukraine alongside French President Emmanuel Macron and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, said Saturday that “the decades of the ‘Pax Americana’ are largely over for us in Europe and for us in Germany as well.”

“Pax Americana” refers to the U.S.’s postwar dominance as a superpower that has brought relative peace to the globe.

Merz warned that Putin’s aim is “a fundamental change to the borders in Europe, the restoration of the old Soviet Union within its borders.”

“If Ukraine falls, he won’t stop,” Merz warned during a party conference in Munich.

Macron, meanwhile, vowed Sunday on social platform X that “France is, and will remain, at Ukraine’s side to build a robust and lasting peace — one that can guarantee Ukraine’s security and sovereignty, and that of Europe, over the long term.”

Putin has denied plans to attack any European allies.

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Ciobanu reported from Warsaw, Poland.

Steve Witkoff, special envoy of the United States, leaves through a hotel garage for talks between representatives of the U.S. and Ukraine in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz,stands in his office in the chancellory in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Maryam Majd)

Steve Witkoff, special envoy of the United States, arrives for talks between representatives of the U.S. and Ukraine, at the Hotel Adlon, in Berlin, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (Kay Nietfeld/dpa via AP)

Jared Kushner, entrepreneur and former chief adviser to President Donald Trump, arrives for talks between representatives of the U.S. and Ukraine at the Hotel Adlon, in Berlin, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (Kay Nietfeld/dpa via AP)

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, right, watches Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arriving at the chancellory in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Maryam Majd)