Environmentalists on Wednesday renewed a beef with the Trump administration on behalf of sand-verbena moths.
In the new lawsuit, the Center for Biological Diversity is challenging the Fish and Wildlife Service’s 2019 decision, made during the first Trump administration, to deny the moths Endangered Species Act protections.
“Five years later, we’re still cleaning up the mess made by the first Trump administration’s callous attitude towards vulnerable wildlife,” Drew Baloga, a legal fellow at the CBD, said in a statement. “With Trump’s second term already wreaking havoc, it’s more important than ever to ensure that the Fish and Wildlife Service is making decisions based on science, not political whims.”
The conservation organization contends that the dune-loving moths are vulnerable to rising sea levels associated with climate change.
