Court Rules in Key Case to Protect One of Earth’s Rarest Whales

Right whales are on the brink of extinction, pushed closer by a rash of recent and unprecedented deaths. Washington, D.C. — A federal court has ruled that federal fisheries managers failed to protect critically endangered North Atlantic right whales when opening nearly 3,000 square miles of previously protected New England marine waters to dangerous fishing gear. There are only around 400 North Atlantic right whales left on earth. In response to litigation from the Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) and Earthjustice, the court ordered that, until the government complies with wildlife and fishery protection laws, it must not allow a certain type of entangling fishing gear in areas where right whales are known to gather. “With nearly 30 North Atlantic right whales killed by human activity since 2017, we’re losing our chance to prevent their extinction,” said Steve Mashuda, Managing Attorney for Earthjustice’s Oceans Program . “Rather than pull out all the stops to arrest this decline, the Trump administration took a see-no-evil approach and expanded the gauntlet of fishing gear that can harm and kill these whales without considering how this would affect the population. The Court’s decision rejects the government’s attempt to whistle past the graveyard when it […]

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