A newly discovered species of moth was recently christened “Neopalpa donaldtrumpi,” not only because the yellow scales that crown the moth’s head resemble Donald Trump’s characteristic hairstyle, but because species naming has become a political statement.
Evolutionary biologist Vazrick Nazari chose this name as a creative response to President Trump’s not merely lacking, but openly antagonistic, environmental policy — a last-ditch effort to make him take an interest in endangered wildlife.
Policymakers need to privilege biodiversity over monolithic agendas that ignore long-term environmental consequences.
The threatened moth’s habitat straddles the southern California border and extends farther south into the Baja California Peninsula of Mexico. The border, while a potent marker of human national divisions, signifies nothing to the fauna that dwell in its proximity. The construction of a border wall would exact an immense environmental toll and would accelerate extinctions on both sides of the border.
House speaker Paul Ryan and a cohort of fellow lawmakers toured the southern border in a helicopter about two weeks ago, surveying the landscape from altitudes much higher than a moth will ever reach.
The aerial view shows the lay of the land, but wildlife remains invisible to the human eye from such lofty heights.
According to a preliminary report from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the proposed border wall would disrupt the habitats of 111 endangered or threatened species and interfere with the routes of 108 varieties of migratory birds.
The report contains a litany of names, some exotic, some familiar, some with traditional Latinate names, and some named for celebrities.
Scrolling through the 33-page bureaucratic register feels interminable, like reading a memorial for something not yet gone.
As the newly classified “Neopalpa donaldtrumpi” reveals, countless species remain unidentified and unnamed. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s estimates are likely gross underestimates when we take into account species not yet identified or classified as at-risk. Current biodiversity is not even completely measurable, and scientists’ estimates of the total number of species in the world vary by tens of millions.
Although “endangered” designates a species seriously at risk of extinction, endangerment is often trivialized.
Yet, extinctions remain not only real, but increasingly rapid in the face of urbanization and globalization.
Furthermore, the classification of a species as endangered does not guarantee any legal protections. The only legal obligation under the Endangered Species Act of 1973 is that proposed federal projects review their potential effects on endangered species and evaluate ways to minimize the detriment.
As a result, current policy only perpetuates a cycle in which newly threatened species replace now-extinct ones on the federal register. Government agencies should instead assess the environmental effects of projects before species make it onto the endangered species list.
In other words, Trump needs to save his moth. Preserving biodiversity is crucial for species both known and unknown.
kmilvert@umail.iu.edu
