The Trump administration enforced a rule on September 14, 2026, that ensures the bog turtle’s extinction. Multiple lawsuits seeking to block the rule are underway.
The bog turtle, North America’s smallest turtle and one of the most beautiful, persists in depleted, isolated populations from New England to North Carolina. A stronghold, if it can be called that, is in Pennsylvania.
Bog turtles are listed as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
It’s still a crime to kill or damage any threatened or endangered plant, invertebrate, fish, reptile, amphibian, bird or mammal, but it’s perfectly okay to destroy all the habitat that those species require for survival, thereby rendering them extinct. “Common sense” is how Trump’s Interior Secretary, Douglas Burgum, defines it.
Wildlife advocates are outraged. Bart Melton of the National Parks Conservation Association writes that the rule “defies common sense” and that it “paves the way for mining, oil and gas drilling, logging, and development in areas that are crucial to the survival of some of our most vulnerable species.”
Earthjustice attorney Kristen Boyles condemns the rule as violating “the core purpose of the statute and decades of legal precedent, including from the U.S. Supreme Court.”
“Taking habitat protections out of the ESA is like taking anti-discrimination provisions out of the Civil Rights Act,” says Animal Wellness Action president Wayne Pacelle. “The law may still bear the same name, but its core provision and promise have been hollowed out.”
For half a century, the ESA defined ‘harm’ as not just human-caused deaths and damage to listed species, but also “significant modification or degradation” of the species’ critical habitat. With that definition, federal agencies and partners saved 99 percent of threatened and endangered species from extinction.
The ESA required federal agencies to develop “recovery plans.” Had they done nothing, they would have violated federal law.
The bog turtle, North America's smallest turtle species, is endangered in Pennsylvania and threatened nationally.
To escape summer heat, bog turtles require soft muck provided by spring-fed fens, bogs, wet meadows and wet pastures. In cooler weather, they need sunlit openings for basking. Most of this habitat has been destroyed by wetland drainage, livestock grazing, land clearing and invasive plants that crowd out the native vegetation with which bog turtles evolved. Because 70 percent of remaining habitat is privately owned, the recovery plan depends on landowner cooperation.
Built into the plan are two regulatory tools called “Safe Harbor” and “Working Lands for Wildlife.” Under Safe Harbor, landowners pledge to restore and maintain bog turtle habitat. In exchange, federal agencies guarantee that signatories won’t face additional restrictions under the ESA if bog turtles proliferate.
To protect and restore bog turtle habitat, “Working Lands for Wildlife” provides landowners with Farm Bill funding and management guidance from federal biologists. In exchange, landowners receive immunity from penalties if a bog turtle is accidentally killed or harmed during routine farming, forestry or road work.
After the Trump administration proposed its bizarre habitat-harm rule on April 15, 2025, the rule received almost 360,000 public comments. While the administration declined to release the number or percentage of negative responses, an Earthjustice analysis revealed that about 99 percent of the comments were opposed. The Administrative Procedure Act requires federal agencies to consider public comments and provide a rational, evidence-based explanation for their final rule. The Trump administration routinely ignored this directive.
If the Trump rule stands, habitat that organisms listed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) require for survival will be officially deemed unnecessary. So there will be no motivation for landowners to honor old Safe Harbor and Working Lands for Wildlife agreements or to sign new ones.
In that case, bog turtles will be repealed along with the most successful habitat protection and restoration law ever enacted.
Ted Williams, of the Circle of Chiefs of the Outdoor Writers Association of America, is a former information officer for the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife and a former columnist for Audubon magazine.
