Whale Protection Initiative

The National Marine Fisheries Services (NMFS) will revise habitat designation in order to protect habitats for the endangered North Atlantic right whales. The revision is in response to a lawsuit filed by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), Defenders of Wildlife, the Center for Biological Diversity, and the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society that confronted the NMFS’s failure to respond to a petition urging the NMFS to expand critical habitat protection beyond New England and the Georgia and Florida coasts in the US. “With a population of only 400 animals, every whale—and every square mile of protected habitat—counts,” staff attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity Sarah Uhlemann said.