Critical endangered Kemp's ridley sea turtles, which rely on Padre Island National Seashore, could be impacted by Trump administration changes to the Endangered Species Act/NPS file

Editor's note: This updates with reaction from politicians and environmental/conservation groups.

In the wake of a report stating that nearly 30,000 species worldwide are at risk of going extinct, the Trump administration on Monday announced changes to the Endangered Species Act that opponents warned would weaken protections for species in danger of being lost. U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, calling the changes an "evisceration of environmental protections," said Congress needs to "consider stopping these regulations by any means."

Less than a month ago the International Union for Conservation of Nature in its Red List report warned that more than 28,000 species -- 27 percent of all assessed species -- were in danger of going extinct. Back in May the United Nations put the number of species at threat of extinction at roughly 1 million.

Against those numbers, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt on Monday announced changes to the Endangered Species Act. They ranged from reducing protections "threatened" species have received under the act to plans to revise how critical habitat for threatened and endangered species is determined. The changes also would allow the economic impacts of listing species to be considered in determining ESA protections, and don't factor in climate change.

“Today, the Trump administration issued regulations that take a wrecking ball to one of our oldest and most effective environmental laws, the Endangered Species Act," said Sen. Udall. "If it weren’t for the Endangered Species Act, some of our most iconic species, including the bald eagle, the grey whale, the grizzly bear, would likely be extinct. For 40 years, the ESA has been a pillar of environmental protection in this nation. Its success and its support among the American people are undeniable. But as we have seen time and time again, no environmental protection, no matter how effective or popular, is safe from the Trump administration."

U.S. Rep. Rául Grijalva, the Arizona Democrat who chairs the House Natural Resources Committee, said, “We are in the middle of an extinction crisis, and President Trump is bulldozing the most important tool we have to protect endangered species. These rollbacks of the ESA are for one purpose only: more handouts to special interests that don’t want to play by the rules and only want to line their pockets."

"This action by the Trump administration adds to their ongoing efforts to clear the way for oil and gas development without any regard for the destruction of wildlife and their habitats," added the congressman. "I have serious questions on whether inappropriate political influence was exerted over decisions that should be based on the best scientific information.”

Congress could halt the new regulations through the Congressional Review Act, which gives the chambers power to overrule regulations. But with the Senate controlled by Republicans, it remains to be seen if that tool would succeed.

At Defenders of Wildlife, President and CEO Jamie Rappaport Clark, a former director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that administers the ESA for terrestrial species, shared Sen. Udall's outrage.

“Just last week the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change provided clear evidence that climate change is threatening the entire world’s food supply. A few months ago an international panel of scientists sounded a related alarm that as many as 1 million species are at risk to extinction due to habitat loss over exploitation and climate change," she said. "So we’re losing species faster than ever before in human history.

“There’s no doubt about it. Humans are the cause. So one could argue the rational response to these kinds of warnings would be to find ways to strengthen our national program to protect endangered and threatened species starting with the Endangered Species Act," added Clark. "But Secretary Bernhardt and the Trump administration are doing exactly the opposite by finalizing today this suite of regulations that severely undercuts the lifesaving potential of the Endangered Species Act.”

Across the National Park System, the changes stand to impact migratory species that need greater expanses of habitat as well as those species that need ESA protections to prevent them from sliding to "endangered" from "threatened" status.

Species that rely on habitat in and around national parks that could be impacted range from the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem grizzly bears, which just recently regained threatened status after a federal judge said the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service erred in delisting the bears, to Kemp's ridley sea turtles, the smallest of sea turtles and which are considered critically endangered. 

"NPCA is very concerned by the new regulations, particularly those related to critical habitat designations for threatened and endangered species and when it could be deemed 'not prudent,'” said Bart Melton, wildlife director for the National Parks Conservation Association. "The challenges of climate change make critical habitat designations a more important tool than ever to have in the toolbox in the fight to protect T&E species. The new regulations appear to discourage critical habitat determinations when climate change is a factor in a species’ decline.

"Additionally, under the new rules it appears federal agencies must first exhaust all options for occupied habitat before considering whether unoccupied habitat could be suitable," he said. "This could make it harder to preserve critical habitat for species whose habitat locations must evolve to new locations because of changing conditions, such as land use change, agriculture, climate change, drought, fire or deforestation."

Under the changes announced Monday, the administration said consideration of critical habitat for threatened and endangered species would begin with areas where those species currently exist "before unoccupied areas are considered."

"The regulations impose a heightened standard for unoccupied areas to be designated as critical habitat," an Interior Department release said.

That decision could turn national park landscapes into even more vital biological islands than they currently are, said Clark.

“Clearly, what this shrinks or compromises is the ability of the biologist to recognize the habitat that will be needed to recover a listed species," she said. "And almost always, particularly those that are habitat-limited, species need more habitat than they current occupy when they’re listed to support recovery. It absolutely will put more pressure on federal lands like national parks and national wildlife refuges in particular, which are more protected land bases than the multiple-use properties."

Additionally, the changes would lessen ESA protections threatened species receive; currently, threatened and endangered species receive the same protections under the act. That change could lead to an accelerated loss of threatened species populations, both Melton and Clark warned.

"It appears the new rules do not limit take' (killing or removal) of threatened species unless species-specific special rules are developed by the Fish and Wildlife Service," said Melton. "This is highly problematic. If your house is burning you put out the fire. You don’t stop, eat a sandwich, develop a plan and then start fighting the fire. The ESA has worked effectively for 40 years, this change does not benefit the conservation future of our national parks."

At the National Audubon Society, Sarah Greenberger said that, “(A)s a whole, the rule changes are political, unwise, and will only increase litigation. They tip the balance in decision-making against vulnerable wildlife and undermine incentives for effective conservation.” 

“While Audubon could have supported some changes that may improve implementation while speeding up support for at-risk wildlife, these damaging new rules will weaken protections for imperiled species and include language that is wholly contrary to the law," added Greenberger, Audubon's senior vice president for conservation policy.

The passenger pigeon, Ivory-billed woodpecker, woodland caribou, Puerto Rican shrew, sea mink, California grizzly bear, Eastern cougar, and the Southern Rocky Mountain wolf. These are just a handful of the 100+ species that have gone extinct, or are teetering on that precipice, and are missing from the National Park System.

More than half of the 419 sites in the National Park System, including national recreation areas, seashores, lakeshores, monuments, battlefields, and other designations, provide habitat for more than 600 threatened and endangered species. The overlap of endangered and threatened species and national parks is illustrated in an interactive map and comprehensive database published by NPCA, with support from Defenders of Wildlife.

In south Florida, not only are highly endangered Florida panthers barely hanging on (though their population currently seems to be moving in the right direction) in an increasingly crowded landscape of developments and roads, but invasive Burmese pythons are feasting on birds and small animals in Big Cypress National Preserve and Everglades National Park.

According to NPCA, efforts to grow populations of the Red wolf in the Southeast (and Great Smoky Mountains National Park) have been hampered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the very agency that's supposed to keep species from blinking out. At Haleakala National Park in Hawai'i, more than 100 plant, animal, and insect species are listed as either endangered for threatened. 

These species' fate is not due to indifference by the National Park Service, but rather by a lack of resources. According to the National Parks Conservation Association and Defenders of Wildlife, Congress has not adequately funded ESA programs within the Fish and Wildlife Service. The lack of resources has left an estimated 500 species still waiting for the Fish and Wildlife Service to assess whether they need ESA protection.

To demonstrate the impact of Trump administation regulations on species, the Center for Conservation Innovation at Defenders of Wildlife developed a "story map" that outlines impacts to specific species from those regulations.