On August 18, Donald Trump’s United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) officially proposed eliminating the national Roadless Rule. If finalized, the repeal would strip protections from 44.7 million acres of wild intact forest. The rule, passed in 2001, protects in total 58 million acres of forest from road building, logging, fossil fuel extraction, and other development.
Source
Anahkwet (Guy Reiter), a member of the Menominee nation and a longtime community organizer, remembers the counsel of his elders about what to do when times get thorny, tangled, and twisted. “If I’m struggling with something in my life, if I’m having a hard time, I was taught to go outside and walk,” Anahkwet told Truthout. “The earth will show me something that I haven’t seen before, or a way of…
Source
The Endangered Species Act has stood as a pillar of conservation in the United States since 1973, bringing animals like bald eagles, manatees, and humpback whales back from the brink of extinction. But now, the Trump administration has taken its boldest step yet in an effort to strip legal protections for endangered species. Starting this week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says that it…
Source
Every three days someone is killed for defending nature. In 2025, watchdog group Global Witness documented 124 such deaths worldwide, a toll researchers say is likely only a fraction of the total number because repression and armed conflict make many deaths impossible to verify. The victims included Indigenous people, small-scale farmers and community organizers peacefully protecting…
Source
The government of French Polynesia plans to challenge an American startup’s proposal to explore the waters just beyond its maritime borders for seabed mining. “We were approached, but we were not consulted,” Moetai Brotherson, the territory’s president, told Grist. “We are not remaining passive while industrial activities are proposed immediately next to ecosystems that French Polynesia has…
Source
“Yet again, the Trump administration has sold out our endangered wildlife to the highest bidder,” said one biodiversity advocate after the US Department of Interior, in a Friday news dump, issued two new policy changes that would weaken the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and make it easier for corporate polluters to prioritize their own bottom lines over habitat protection. The US Fish and…
Source