Watchdog Asks Trump Admin to Reverse Flawed Listing Impacting Gulf Industries

PPT files Request for Correction, noting faulty process in original Rice’s whale classification.

Protect The Public’s Trust (PPT) announced today it has filed a Request for Correction with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) under the Information Quality Act, asking it to “reverse the listing of the Rice’s whale under the Endangered Species Act [ESA].” The Trump administration announced in May that it has launched an investigation into the reclassification of the Rice’s whale as an endangered species.

PPT’s request asserts the complete reclassification of a small subspecies of Bryde’s whale as a separate species known as the Rice’s whale was based on faulty information and a flawed process. The research was questionable, with findings published in a manner riddled with apparent conflicts of interest. Despite these problems, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) still reclassified the whale as its own species falling under the ESA.

The reclassification was pounced upon by activist organizations, leading to regulatory restrictions limiting commerce and industries in the Gulf of America, with significant impacts on the economy and national security. Environmental groups immediately weaponized the listing to block oil and gas drilling, impose vessel speed limits, and tie up leases in litigation. The ramifications of this change on the energy industry were ameliorated when the Trump administration intervened and carved out an exemption for oil and gas production in March, but the effects continue in other industries in the Gulf.

One of the significant problem areas behind the reclassification is that the two papers upon which the reclassification were based were written by teams led by the same researcher, who also had significant power in the two institutions that separately published and reviewed her work. PPT believes this represents a conflict of interest within the reclassification process that fatally compromised it.

Dr. Paticia Rosel was the lead NMFS scientist and lead author of the two papers, published in 2016 and 2021. She was Deputy Editor of “Marine Mammal Science,” the journal that published her 2021 paper, as well as the chair of the “SMM Committee on Taxonomy,” the group that formally evaluated and accepted its conclusions. In turn, its acceptance was cited by the Rosel-led NMFS as the basis for reclassifying the whale. As such, PPT contends that the reclassification process was sullied as it did not involve truly independent entities, with Rosel’s apparent involvement occurring in each step.

And a more recent study by Dr. R.W. Davis of Texas A&M suggests the Rice’s whale may not even be a distinct species at all – just a surviving population of the Bryde’s whale, which is not considered endangered.

PPT hopes NOAA and NMFS will review this and other aspects of this case.

“The Trump administration’s decision to review the Rice’s whale classification is a welcome development,” PPT director Michael Chamberlain said.  “A principle that is supposed to guide these processes is that the greater the potential impact, the higher the bar should be set for evidence upon which to make a decision. In this case, with profound implications for the economy, energy, and national security, the bar was set disturbingly low. This is what happens when the federal government does not employ Gold Standard scientific standards: it ends up with actions sullied by conflicts of interest and chain of custody questions, with the American public suffering the consequences.”

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