Standing Strong for Life on Earth
Stopping the Second Trump Administration’s Anti-Environment Attacks
During President Donald Trump’s first term, the Center for Biological Diversity filed 266 lawsuits challenging his administration’s attempts to block progress on climate change, kill wildlife, endanger public health, destroy public lands, and otherwise harm the planet.
We won nearly 9 out of 10 times — and we’re not about to slow down now.
“Trump 2.0 is going to get twice the fight from the protectors of our planet, wildlife, and basic human rights,” said Executive Director Kierán Suckling. “We’ve battled Trump from the border wall to the Arctic Wildlife Refuge, and in many cases we’ve won. This country’s bedrock environmental laws stand strong. We’re more prepared than ever to block the disastrous Trump policies we know are coming.”
This time around, so far we’ve filed 17 suits defending life on Earth from harmful actions by the second Trump administration. Read on for details.
17. April 02, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges Outdated Plans for Aging Oil Platforms Off California Coast
The Center for Biological Diversity and the Wishtoyo Chumash Foundation filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over the federal failure to require updated development and production plans for oil drilling at the Santa Ynez Unit off the California coast.
16. March 28, 2025 – Lawsuit Aims to Protect Nantahala-Pisgah Forest From Destructive Logging Plan
A coalition of conservation groups sued the Trump administration over the U.S. Forest Service’s Nantahala-Pisgah forest plan. The plan allows for a five-fold increase in logging that violates federal law by overlooking harms to forests, water quality and wildlife.
15. March 27, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges Trump Administration Over Delayed Protections for Two California Salamanders
The Center for Biological Diversity sued the Trump administration for delaying Endangered Species Act protections for the Kern Canyon slender salamander and relictual slender salamander in California.
14. March 18, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges Trump Administration Failure to Review Flawed Oil, Gas Industry Air-Pollution Permits in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah
The Center for Biological Diversity sued the Trump administration’s Environmental Protection Agency over its delay in responding to challenges to air-pollution permits for oil and gas processing facilities in Colorado, New Mexico and Utah.
13. March 13, 2025 – Lawsuit Seeks to Protect 11 South Florida Species
The Center for Biological Diversity, represented by the Jacobs Public Interest Law Clinic for Democracy and the Environment at Stetson University College of Law, sued the Trump administration for delaying Endangered Species Act protection for a lizard, two snakes, and eight plants found in South Florida.
12. March 10, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges Federal Failure to Regulate Dangerous Phosphate Mining Waste
The Center and conservation, public health, and environmental justice allies sued the Trump administration over the federal failure to respond to a petition requesting stronger oversight of toxic and radioactive waste from phosphate mining and fertilizer production.
11. February 27, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges Trump Administration Failure to Protect Gulf of Mexico’s Smalltail Shark
The Center for Biological Diversity sued the Trump administration for its failure to decide whether to protect smalltail sharks under the Endangered Species Act. The sharks live in nearshore waters of the western Atlantic Ocean from Brazil to the northern Gulf of Mexico.
10. February 27, 2025 – Lawsuit Seeks Records on DOGE Structure, Musk’s Mission in Trump Administration
The Center Biological Diversity sued the Trump administration, including Elon Musk, to obtain public records on the activities of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. The lawsuit appears to be the first contending that DOGE itself is an “agency” for purposes of the Freedom of Information Act.
9. February 26, 2025 – Lawsuit Seeks Endangered Species Act Protections for Washington’s Sand-Verbena Moth
The Center for Biological Diversity sued the Trump administration seeking Endangered Species Act protections for sand-verbena moths. These highly imperiled moths were denied protections in 2019 when Trump was first in office.
8. February 19, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges Trump Order to Undo Ocean Protections From Offshore Drilling
Conservation groups filed the first environmental lawsuit against the Trump administration to protect oceans from offshore drilling. One set of groups is challenging an illegal order by President Trump to revoke former President Biden’s withdrawal of vulnerable areas of the ocean from future oil-and-gas leasing. Another set is asking a court to reinstate a federal court ruling that invalidated an attempt by the first Trump administration to undo Obama-era offshore protections.
7. February 19, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges EPA’s Approval of Radioactive Roads
The Center for Biological Diversity sued Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency today for approving the use of radioactive phosphogypsum in road construction at Mosaic’s New Wales facility in Mulberry, Florida.
6. February 18, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges Massive Idaho Gold Mine Threatening Wildlife, Public Health
Local and national conservation groups sued Trump’s U.S. Forest Service to challenge its approval of the Stibnite Gold Project, an open-pit cyanide leach gold mine in Idaho’s Salmon River Mountains. The mine would jeopardize public health and clean water, harm threatened plants and animals, and permanently scar thousands of acres of public land in the headwaters of the South Fork Salmon River.
5. February 18, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges USDA’s Killing of Texas Wildlife
The Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit in federal court to stop Trump’s U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services program from trapping, shooting and poisoning Texas’ wildlife.
4. February 18, 2025 – Lawsuit Aims to Protect Spring-Run Chinook Salmon in Pacific Northwest
The Center for Biological Diversity and allies sued Trump’s National Marine Fisheries Service for delaying Endangered Species Act protection decisions for spring-run Chinook salmon in Oregon, Washington and Northern California.
3. February 5, 2025 – Lawsuit Challenges Federal Approvals for New Oil, Gas Drilling on California Public Lands
Health and conservation groups sued Trump’s Bureau of Land Management, challenging its approvals of new oil and gas drilling permits on public lands in California’s San Joaquin Valley. Despite an ongoing legal challenge to its permitting system in the region, the BLM continues to hand over drilling permits to fossil fuel companies at the expense of public health, the environment and the law.
2. February 04, 2025 – Lawsuit Demands Records Supporting Finding That Spraying Insecticides Across Millions of Western Acres Harms None of Region’s 201 Endangered Species
The Center for Biological Diversity sued Trump’s U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for failing to release records documenting its finding that insecticides sprayed across millions of acres in 17 states do not harm any of the area’s 201 endangered plants and animals.
1. January 20, 2025 – Lawsuit Seeks Records on Elon Musk, DOGE’s Role in Trump Transition
The Center Biological Diversity sued the Trump administration to obtain public records showing how people claiming to represent the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, were interacting with the White House since the presidential transition began in November.