Groups File First Environmental Lawsuit Vs. New Trump Administration, Challenging Illegal Order to Undo Ocean Protections from Offshore Drilling

Today, groups concerned about the threats from offshore drilling filed the first environmental legal challenge against the new Trump administration. One group is challenging an illegal order by President Trump to revoke former President Biden’s withdrawal of vulnerable areas of the ocean from future oil-and-gas leasing. Another set of groups is taking a related action asking a court to reinstate a federal court ruling that invalidated an attempt by the first Trump administration to undo Obama-era offshore protections. President Trump has attempted to open nearly the entire Arctic Ocean to drilling by reviving his first-term order.

President Biden protected areas off the Eastern Gulf, Atlantic, Pacific, and Alaska coasts by invoking his authority under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act. The law authorizes the president to withdraw offshore areas from oil and gas leasing, as eight administrations, including the first Trump administration, have routinely done. However, the law does not authorize the president to revoke the withdrawals of prior presidents, which a federal court confirmed when Trump attempted to undo Obama-era protections for the Arctic Ocean and portions of the Atlantic oceans during his first term.

In the new case, Earthjustice is representing Oceana, Center for Biological Diversity, the Surfrider Foundation, Greenpeace, Healthy Gulf, Northern Alaska Environmental Center, Alaska Wilderness League, and Turtle Island Restoration Network. Plaintiffs Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) are each representing themselves.

The plaintiffs in the related litigation to reinstate protections for the Arctic and parts of the Atlantic include League of Conservation Voters, Defenders of Wildlife, NRDC, Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity, Northern Alaska Environmental Center, Greenpeace, and Alaska Wilderness League. These groups are represented by Earthjustice and NRDC.

“We defeated Trump the first time he tried to roll back protections and sacrifice more of our waters to the oil industry. We’re bringing this abuse of the law to the courts again,” said Earthjustice managing attorney for oceans Steve Mashuda. “Trump is illegally trying to take away protections vital to coastal communities that rely on clean, healthy oceans for safe living conditions, thriving economies, and stable ecosystems.”

“Protecting the eastern Gulf has long been a bipartisan effort in Florida,” said Martha Collins, Executive Director of Healthy Gulf. President Trump used the same authority as President Biden to protect the eastern Gulf and Florida coastline from offshore oil and gas. President Biden simply made those protections permanent, something President Trump did not do. President Trump has now shown he could care less about protecting the eastern Gulf or Florida. Unfortunately we have to file suit to stand up against the rash and inconsistent policies of the Trump administration to enforce what both FL Republicans and Democrats have fought for years on. Permanent protections from offshore oil and gas in Florida.”

“Trump’s putting our oceans, marine wildlife, and coastal communities at risk of devastating oil spills and we need the courts to rein in his utter contempt for the law,” said Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Offshore oil drilling is destructive from start to finish. Opening up more public waters to the oil industry for short-term gain and political points is a reprehensible and irresponsible way to manage our precious ocean ecosystems.”

“President Trump’s executive order would roll back millions of acres of ocean protection, jeopardizing our coastal economies and the people who rely on healthy, thriving oceans,” said Oceana Campaign Director Joseph Gordon. “Leaders in both political parties, thousands of businesses, and millions of Americans support permanently protecting our coasts from offshore drilling. We are confident the court will continue to uphold the bipartisan tradition of presidents safeguarding these coastlines and protecting the people who live and work among them.”

“Offshore drilling is a dirty and damaging practice that is a direct threat to our thriving ocean recreation economy. Offshore drilling is opposed by a majority of Americans who want to protect our nation’s coasts from oil and gas development. The Surfrider Foundation is pleased to join partners in challenging President Trump’s illegal order to revoke critical protections for U.S. waters,” said Dr. Chad Nelsen, CEO of the Surfrider Foundation.

“Living on the Gulf coast, I have seen first-hand the harmful impacts to people and places by the oil and gas industry,” said Joanie Steinhaus, Ocean Program Director for Turtle Island Restoration Network. “The western and central Gulf of Mexico has long been a sacrifice zone to place profit over people and our coast, and we will stand with our partners to ensure the protection of the fragile ocean ecosystem from the Trump administration.”

“We have seen the impact of offshore drilling on our vulnerable ocean waters, and what it does to the surrounding communities, marine life, and the health of the ecosystem,” said Sierra Club Senior Attorney Devorah Ancel. “When nearly 40% of Americans live in coastal counties that rely on a healthy ocean to thrive, removing critical protections shows how little care Trump has for these communities. Trump tried this illegal move to undo protections during his first administration, and he failed. We will keep working to ensure he won’t be any more successful this time around.”

“Trump’s executive order is an unlawful giveaway to the fossil fuel industry that puts marine ecosystems, coastal economies, and the climate at risk,” said Christy Goldfuss, Executive Director at NRDC. “The law is clear: once a president permanently withdraws ocean areas from oil and gas leasing, those protections cannot simply be undone. With the Trump administration aggressively dismantling environmental safeguards, the courts will be a crucial backstop. When Trump puts polluters over the law, we’ll see him in court.”

“We shouldn’t have to file our suit again because President Trump already lost the last time he tried this,” said Gene Karpinski, President of League of Conservation Voters which led a coalition of groups’ successful challenge in the first Trump administration. “We are signaling to congress, the president, and the people of this country our commitment to defending already-protected coastal communities and waters from risky and dirty offshore drilling.”

“The Arctic Ocean has been protected from U.S. drilling for nearly a decade, and those protections have been affirmed by the federal courts,” said Sierra Weaver, senior attorney at Defenders of Wildlife. “Though these coastlines have been protected, the administration is showing no restraint in seeking to hand off some of our most fragile and pristine landscapes for the oil industry’s profit.”

“President Trump and his Big Oil cronies are taking steps to further fuel the climate chaos that is devastating communities across our nation,” said Arlo Hemphill, Greenpeace USA Oceans Are Life Campaign Lead. “This reckless push to dismantle vital ocean protections for the sake of profit exposes their willingness to line the pockets of wealthy oil executives while throwing millions of American families under the bus. By selling out the oceans to the highest bidder, they are gambling with our health, our safety, and our very lives. The cost is clear-communities are suffering, families are being financially ruined, and lives are being lost. Greenpeace USA will not stand by while corporate polluters and a President who values profits over people take this backward step to threaten our future. We will fight back against this blatant assault on our planet and our communities.”

Background

In January, former president Biden permanently protected the eastern U.S. Atlantic coast, or approximately 269 million acres of the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) from Canada to the southern tip of Florida; 65 million acres of the Eastern Gulf of Mexico; nearly 250 million acres of Federal waters off the coasts of Washington, Oregon, and California; and 44 million acres in the Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience Area in Alaska. Earlier in his administration, Biden protected 2.8 million acres of the Beaufort Sea.

In 2021, Biden also reinstated President Obama’s protections for 125 million acres in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas as well as 3.8 million acres of canyon areas in the north and mid-Atlantic that Trump attempted to undo in his first administration. As part of his current attack on the oceans, President Trump also revived this very same unlawful order, attempting again to open the entire Arctic Ocean to oil drilling.

Nearly 400 municipalities and over 2,300 elected officials across the Atlantic, Pacific, and Gulf coasts have formally opposed the expansion of offshore drilling in these areas. Hundreds of organizations and lawmakers supported the President taking this action. Nearly every governor along the East and West coasts — Republican and Democrat alike — has expressed concerns about expanded oil and gas drilling off their coastlines.

Meanwhile, despite false claims that the Biden protections would disturb U.S. energy security, those withdrawals leave open most of the Gulf of Mexico for oil leasing, where nearly all of U.S. offshore drilling occurs. Moreover, the oil industry already has an excess under lease in the Gulf and the U.S. is currently producing more oil than any nation in history and is also the world’s largest producer of gas. Rather than opening whole new areas to drilling, both climate change and justice demand that we finally reduce the amount of leasing and drilling in the Gulf, where communities have too long borne the brunt of the harm caused by offshore drilling.