Bald eagles must be protected to the fullest extent of the law from dangerous wind turbines, President Trump’s interior secretary declared this week.
But four months ago, President Trump called for gutting the very law that applies, the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, calling it a burden on oil and gas producers.
Trump administration officials insisted there is no conflict between the two positions and said the president is consistently enforcing laws for all forms of energy development.
“President Trump has taken vast measures to unleash American energy by rolling back regulatory burdens while continuing to enforce the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act to protect the Bald Eagle species — a historic symbol of American greatness,” Taylor Rogers, a White House spokeswoman, said in a statement.
Conservationists said the Trump administration’s embrace of America’s iconic bird is just a pretext for attacking the wind industry, which the president has publicly seethed about ever since he lost a legal battle to stop a wind farm from being built in view of one of his Scottish golf courses.
It also underscores the double standard the Trump administration has for months employed around energy policy. Mr. Trump has declared that the United States faces an energy “emergency” but has taken dozens of steps to throttle the development of wind and solar power. And in easing the way for coal, oil and gas development, the Trump administration has proposed several measures that would weaken protections for eagles and other migratory birds.
“All of the concern for eagles is concentrated solely on wind right now,” said Sarah Krakoff, a professor of environmental law at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
Wind energy is responsible for less than 0.01 percent of human-caused bird fatalities, according to the American Clean Power Association, a renewable energy lobbying group. Federal data shows wind turbines cause significantly fewer bird deaths than buildings, cats or oil pits. The Audubon Society says that climate change poses a bigger threat to birds than wind power.
When it comes to bald eagles, the leading cause of death varies by region, but power line collisions and lead poisoning are consistently cited as major threats. In Michigan, avian influenza has led to the deaths of at least 18 eagles this year, according to the state’s Department of Natural Resources.
The bald eagle, with its white head and yellow beak, appears on the Great Seal of the United States, flags, currency and military insignia but was only officially designated the national bird in 2024.
It is protected under the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act of 1940. The law prohibits anyone from killing, wounding or “taking” eagles (including their feathers, nests or eggs) unless granted a permit by the interior secretary. Violations can result in fines, criminal penalties or even prison time.
The law, along with the Endangered Species Act of 1973 and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, has been credited with bringing the bald eagle back from the brink of extinction in addition to the banning of the insecticide DDT in 1972.
President Trump has sought to weaken all three laws.
In March the administration announced it would no longer penalize companies for accidentally killing birds under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and blocked a regulation proposed during the Biden administration that would have enshrined additional protections for birds.
The move was viewed as a major victory for oil and gas companies, which argued the industry was unfairly prosecuted for accidental bird deaths.
The administration also proposed to weaken the Endangered Species Act by excluding the destruction of habitat from the definition of what it means to harm imperiled plants and animals. The oil industry said that would speed up permits and make it easier to drill in the United States.
And in April, Mr. Trump signed an executive order that directed agencies to sunset regulations that stem from the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, along with other federal laws. “By rescinding outdated regulations that serve as a drag on progress, we can stimulate innovation and deliver prosperity to everyday Americans,” the order said.
In recent weeks the administration has issued a barrage of rules aimed at blocking wind and solar production.
In one of them, protecting bald eagles suddenly emerged as a Trump administration priority.
“Wind projects are known to kill eagles, and climate extremists in the Biden admin still greenlit scores of these projects,” Doug Burgum, the interior secretary, wrote on X on Monday. The agency now “is enforcing the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act to ensure that our national bird is not sacrificed for unreliable wind facilities!” he wrote.
Mr. Burgum directed the Fish and Wildlife Service to review of a regulation that currently allows wind energy companies to obtain a permit to incidentally “take” or harm a certain number of eagles during their operations, provided they take steps to minimize harm.
Mr. Burgum also called on the agency to review violations that have occurred under the law, and “where appropriate,” refer them to the Department of Justice, raising the possibility that wind operators could be criminally prosecuted for eagle deaths.
William Bowerman, a professor of wildlife ecology and toxicology at the University of Maryland, said wind turbines “can have a detrimental effect” on bald and golden eagles but not enough to threaten the overall population.
Some called the new bald eagle policy cynical.
“If they cared about eagles they would create regulatory protections for them,” said Tracy Stone-Manning, president of The Wilderness Society who led the Bureau of Land Management under the Biden administration.
Ms. Krakoff, the law professor, said she believes the Trump administration is likely to lose legal challenges in its effort to crack down on wind, given that many of the same rules have been loosened for oil and gas. “That will be hard to defend as anything other than arbitrary,” she said.
Lisa Friedman is a Times reporter who writes about how governments are addressing climate change and the effects of those policies on communities.
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