Florida sets record for sea turtle nests but Trump move could stall recovery

Loggerhead turtles abound this season but rollback of Endangered Species Act protections could threaten future

Wildlife groups in Florida are celebrating record numbers of sea turtle nests this season, but experts warn Donald Trump’s recent gutting of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) could reverse decades of their recovery from the edge of extinction.

With more than two months of the summer nesting season still to run, loggerhead turtles have already laid 13,770 nests, hundreds more than recorded in any previous year, along an 8.5-mile stretch of shoreline monitored by the Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach, on Florida’s Atlantic coast.