In Decisive Ruling, Court Finds Government Failed to Protect More Than 1,500 Endangered Species From Toxic Pesticide Malathion

WASHINGTON— In a major victory for endangered species, a federal court ruled today that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service failed to adequately protect more than 1,500 imperiled species from the insecticide malathion — in violation of the Endangered Species Act.

Today’s ruling comes in response to a Center for Biological Diversity challenge of the Service’s 2022 final biological opinion on malathion, which concluded that the pesticide does not pose an extinction risk to a single protected species of wildlife or plant.

“The court’s decision is a much-needed course correction for the Fish and Wildlife Service, which submitted to the pesticide industry’s demands and hung more than 1,500 endangered species out to dry,” said Lori Ann Burd, environmental health director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “This decision will force the Service to figure out how to actually reduce harm to animals and plants from one of the worst neurotoxic pesticides on the market. That includes nearly every endangered butterfly, beetle and dragonfly we have.”