An environmental group is planning to sue the U.S. Department of the
Interior. Rebecca Williams reports the group accuses the agency of
interfering with decisions on 55 endangered species:
Transcript
An environmental group is planning to sue the U.S. Department of the
Interior. Rebecca Williams reports the group accuses the agency of
interfering with decisions on 55 endangered species:
The Center for Biological Diversity says the federal government made
decisions about endangered species based on politics instead of
science.
This past spring the Office of the Inspector General investigated a top
official in the Interior Department. The report found that Deputy
Assistant Secretary Julie MacDonald reshaped scientific decisions on
endangered species. MacDonald resigned after the report came out.
Kieran Suckling is with the Center for Biological Diversity. He says
political interference with the Endangered Species Act is still
widespread:
“This is way beyond MacDonald, it’s a systematic problem and it’s far
from being solved.”
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is reviewing a number of endangered
species decisions that were made during MacDonald’s tenure.
For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.