Overview
- The Departments of the Interior and Commerce finalized the rule on July 10, 2026, removing habitat modification from the regulatory definition of “harm” under the 1973 Endangered Species Act.
- Officials said the rule confines protections to actions that directly injure or kill listed species and argued the change restores the law’s original meaning and reduces permitting and compliance costs for industries and landowners.
- The administration cited the 2024 Supreme Court decision in Loper Bright v. Raimondo as the legal basis for rewriting the agencies’ interpretation of the statute.
- Conservation groups and attorneys general from multiple states immediately signaled lawsuits, saying the narrower rule will allow habitat destruction that threatens species and that they will seek court review.
- The shift reverses a decades-long agency practice upheld in a 1995 Supreme Court case that treated significant habitat modification as a form of harm, and it could reshape permitting for drilling, mining, logging and development on lands and waters.