Photo by: NOAA
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a rejection of the state of Alaska’s petition to strip the Arctic ringed seal of protection under the Endangered Species Act.
“I’m so relieved these adorable seals will keep their Endangered Species Act protections,” said Marlee Goska, Alaska staff attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “The science is overwhelmingly clear that climate change is threatening the seals’ existence. The court rightly recognized there’s no scientific or legal reason for Alaska’s cruel attempt to strip away safeguards these seals need to survive our rapidly heating world.”
The Center originally petitioned the National Marine Fisheries Service to list the seal under the Endangered Species Act in 2008, which the agency then did in 2012. The 9th Circuit upheld the listing in 2018 over objections from the state of Alaska, the oil industry and others. Then the state, the North Slope Borough, and several groups petitioned to delist the species.
The Fisheries Service denied that delisting petition under the first Trump administration, concluding that the petition failed to “present substantial scientific or commercial information” that would justify delisting the seal. The petitioners challenged that decision in federal court in Alaska in late 2022, and the Center then intervened in the case to defend the agency’s decision.
Last week’s 9th Circuit decision affirms a district court opinion rejecting Alaska’s arguments that the Fisheries Service’s decision was improper. It also affirms the 9th Circuit’s earlier ruling that the agency “need not wait until” the seal’s sea ice “habitat is destroyed to determine that habitat loss may facilitate extinction.”
“Ringed seals have a shot at survival thanks to the Endangered Species Act, but only if we rapidly reduce the pollution destroying their habitat,” Goska stated. “We’ll keep fighting the Trump administration’s reckless attempts to open more of the Arctic to oil and gas drilling.”
Ringed seals give birth in snow caves built on sea ice. Climate change is diminishing the Arctic snowpack, leading to cave collapses and leaving pups vulnerable to freezing or predators. The Arctic is warming nearly four times faster than the rest of the planet.
Listing ringed seals under the Endangered Species Act offers them increased protection from oil and gas development. This listing does not affect subsistence harvest of the species by Alaskan Natives.
