Endangered Species Transparency and Reasonableness Act of 2022 2022-09-30 Introduced in House Endangered Species Transparency and Reasonableness Act of 2022

This bill revises requirements concerning determinations on whether a species is a threatened or endangered species under the Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA) and caps attorney's fees to prevailing parties in ESA citizen suits.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) must publish online, subject to privacy or administrative limitations, the best scientific and commercial data available that are the basis for each determination.

The bill states that the term best scientific and commercial data available includes all data submitted by a state, tribal, or county government. Thus, the USFWS and NMFS would no longer consider whether data from those sources are the best scientific and commercial data available. Instead, the data would be automatically deemed the best scientific and commercial data available regardless of the quality of the data.

Before making a determination on whether a species is an endangered or threatened species, the USFWS and NMFS must provide affected states with all of the data that is the basis of the determination.

The Department of the Interior must also publish and maintain an online searchable database that discloses federal expenditures related to litigation under the ESA.

]]> text/xml EN Pursuant to Title 17 Section 105 of the United States Code, this file is not subject to copyright protection and is in the public domain. Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress This file contains bill summaries for federal legislation. A bill summary describes the most significant provisions of a piece of legislation and details the effects the legislative text may have on current law and federal programs. Bill summaries are authored by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) of the Library of Congress. As stated in Public Law 91-510 (2 USC 166 (d)(6)), one of the duties of CRS is "to prepare summaries and digests of bills and resolutions of a public general nature introduced in the Senate or House of Representatives". For more information, refer to the User Guide that accompanies this file.