The Trump administration had claimed the 1918 Migratory Bird Treaty Act barred the intentional hunting of birds, not unintentional deaths caused by industrial activities.
(CN) The Biden administration voided a Trump-era legal opinion Monday regarding migratory birds and protections that have been in place for over a century.
The Department of Interior reversed legal interpretation by its former top lawyer Daniel Jorjani in 2017 that parties could not be held responsible for the accidental deaths of birds, even in deaths related to a chemical spill, oil and gas operations, power lines or wind turbines.
The Trump administration argued the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, passed in 1918, meant to cover the intentional hunting of migratory birds and was not intended to hold industry and private actors responsible for unintentional deaths.
An Interior spokesman said the Trump policy “overturned decades of bipartisan and international consensus and allowed industry to kill birds with impunity.”
Federal policy that weakened wild bird protections revoked
4 weeks 2 days 5 hours ago
Tuesday, March 09 2021
Mar 9, 2021
March 09, 2021 6:32 AM
March 09, 2021
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Source: Associated Press
Generic image of an eagle
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) The Biden administration on Monday reversed a policy imposed under former President Donald Trump that drastically weakened the government’s power to enforce a century-old law that protects most U.S. bird species.
Trump ended criminal prosecutions against companies responsible for bird deaths that could have been prevented.
The move halted enforcement practices under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act in place for decades resulting most notably in a $100 million settlement by energy company BP after the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill killed about 100,000 birds, according to federal data. Some scientists have said that number could be higher.