•      "NPCA urges members of Congress to vote no on H.R. 1897, the ESA Amendments Act, when it comes to the House floor the week of April 20, 2026. For 50 years, the Endangered Species Act (ESA) has been a critically important tool in the conservation and restoration of the over 600 threatened and endangered species that depend on habitats in national parks. Species like the California condor, humpback whale, and Santa Rosa Island fox have all benefited from the restoration and recovery framework and support the ESA provides. While NPCA has concerns about many sections of H.R. 1897, we’ve highlighted our primary concerns below: Title I would likely politicize which species are prioritized for recovery, extending the timeline for listing species and fast-tracking delistings. These decisions should be made based on the best available science and removed from political input and analysis. Congress should instead focus on funding the existing science-based prioritization process, as well as the agencies’ long underfunded and understaffed recovery efforts… In Title III, Section 301 appears to create a sliding scale that decreases species protections as “recovery goals” are met for threatened species. It also allows states to submit strategies that are adopted as recovery plans. This cuts at the core of the ESA." Source: Christina Hazard, Legislative Director of Government Affairs of the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA)

•      "A vote on one of the most consequential wildlife bills in decades, the ESA Amendments Act (H.R. 1897) – a sneak attack on our nation's strongest environmental law – could happen as early as next week. This bill has already cleared the House Natural Resources Committee. House leadership can bring it to the floor at any time. If passed, it would weaken the Endangered Species Act at nearly every stage of protection. It allows species to wait years for protection instead of requiring decisions within 12 months, allowing agencies to sit on their hands for political reasons while rare plants and wildlife go extinct. It restricts critical habitat to where species exist today, ignoring the landscapes they will need as the climate changes, and frustrating their ability to expand into historically-occupied habitats and achieve more resilient populations. It weakens how science is applied in decision-making, and limits the government's ability to require mitigation for habitat destruction. It also makes it significantly harder to find “jeopardy” by requiring agencies to prove that a single project alone causes harm, rather than accounting for the cumulative impacts that are driving most species' declines. So species will go extinct in a death-by-a-thousand-cuts… It is a structural rollback of the law that has prevented the extinction of 99 percent of listed species." Source: Western Watersheds Project 

•      "For more than five decades, the Endangered Species Act has stood as one of America’s most effective tools for preventing extinctions. Its strength lies in a commitment to clear, science-based decision-making and an understanding that safeguarding at-risk species is a matter of national importance. The proposed revisions would erode the Act’s foundational principles. By introducing uncertainty, weakening long- standing protections, and narrowing the pathways through which vulnerable species receive attention and support, these changes would make it harder for species to persist and recover… We are deeply concerned about the cumulative impacts the proposed changes would have on the conservation of imperiled species—particularly insects and other invertebrates… Already vastly underrepresented on the ESA list of protected species, the proposed revisions would make it even harder for rapidly declining invertebrate species to receive the swift protections they need to survive. The proposed revisions mirror changes introduced in 2019 that were ultimately withdrawn because they undermined the ESA’s purpose. Then, and now, the proposed measures run afoul of scientific expertise and legal precedent – and go against strong public, bipartisan support for a robust, science-driven ESA that preserves our shared natural heritage." Source: Rosemary Malfi, Policy Director of the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation