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General Land Office of State of Texas v. U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
General Land Office of State of Texas v. U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service ↗
1:17-cv-00538W.D. Tex.11 entries
Filing Date
Type
Action Taken
Document
Summary
02/06/2019
Decision
Texas's motion for summary judgment denied and defendants' cross-motion for summary judgment granted.
The federal district court for the Western District of Texas upheld the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (FWS’s) 90-day finding that supported denial of a petition to remove the golden-cheeked warbler from the list of endangered species. A 2014 review of the warbler’s status found that the warbler was still threatened by widespread destruction of its habitat; at that time, the warbler had been classified as “critically vulnerable” to climate change. In 2015, a petition to delist was submitted, and in 2016, the FWS found that the petition to delist failed to present information regarding the threats of habitat destruction and fragmentation and regarding how those threats affected analysis of other potential threats. The FWS also found that the petition to delist failed to present any information on other potential threats to the warbler’s survival, including climate change. In upholding the FWS’s findings, the court rejected the argument that the review of the petition to delist was overly stringent, as well as the argument that the FWS acted arbitrarily and capriciously by listing the warbler as endangered while refusing to designate critical habitat.
08/15/2018
Reply
Reply filed by federal defendants in support of cross-motion for summary judgment.
–
07/31/2018
Opposition
Plaintiffs filed opposition to defendants' cross-motion for summary judgment and reply to defendants' opposition to plaintiff's motion for summary judgment.
–
07/12/2018
Amicus Motion/Brief
Amicus curiae brief filed by Travis Audubon Society et al. in opposition to plaintiff's motion for summary judgment and in support of federal defendants' cross motion for summary judgment.
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General Land Office of the State of Texas v. U.S. Department of the Interior ↗
19-50178United States Federal Courts, United States Fifth Circuit (5th Cir.)1 entry
Filing Date
Type
Action Taken
Document
Summary
01/15/2020
Decision
Decision denying the delisting petition vacated and remanded to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for further proceedings.
The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) decision denying a petition to delist the golden-cheeked warbler was arbitrary and capricious because the FWS applied “an inappropriately heightened” standard to its review of the delisting petition. The court said the FWS should not have required that the petition contain information that the FWS had not considered in its five-year review of the species that was sufficient to refute the five-year review’s conclusions that the warbler should remain listed. The Fifth Circuit’s opinion did not mention climate change, but climate change was one of the additional threats to the warbler that the FWS said the delisting petition failed to present information to address.