Paxton settlement ends endangered lizard protection

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has secured a settlement vacating and remanding the Biden Administration’s listing of the dunes sagebrush lizard as endangered, a legal victory he says ends an unlawful rule that threatened the state’s oil and gas industry.

In September 2024, Paxton sued the Biden Administration over its decision to list the lizard as endangered, claiming the listing violated the Endangered Species Act and the Administrative Procedure Act.

According to the Office of the Attorney General, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service relied on data that fell short of the “best available” standard and ignored its own internal listing policies. The agency also made arbitrary assumptions about the oil and gas industry’s impact on the species while leaving the industry without clear guidance on what conduct would violate the rule’s protections.

Under the settlement reached with the Trump Administration, USFWS acknowledged that, under Biden, it failed to properly account for habitat restoration efforts in its...