The Debate That American Conservationists Should Be Having

The Endangered Species Act always had a hole in it. It was intended to protect ecosystems as well as individual species—it says so right in the original 1973 text—but it has no provisions to do so directly. Habitat destruction has been the most common threat to endangered species in the U.S. since 1975. If the administration succeeds in redefining harm to exclude it, the Endangered Species Act won’t be able to effectively protect most endangered species. But the Trump administration has now opened that debate—forcing a conversation about how we protect species and ecosystems that some conservationists say is long overdue.