After President Donald Trump canceled a report on the state of nature in the United States, the scientists working on it — many from the Seattle area — say they’ll continue their work and build on it.
The report, announced by President Joe Biden during a visit to Seattle’s Seward Park on Earth Day in 2022, was intended to be the country’s first nationwide assessment of the state of nature.
In all, more than 150 scientists were at work on the assessment across the country — and they had nearly completed the first draft of their work. Then Phil Levin, professor of practice in the University of Washington College of the Environment, and the national director for the report, was informed shortly after Trump took office that the assessment was being terminated.
He said he got the news indirectly, and without explanation other than the one he was required to send to project participants: “ … as called for in the Executive Order Unleashing American Energy, released on January 20, 2025, we are discontinuing the work on the National Nature Assessment.”
Trump’s order was a broadside against a wide range of green energy and environmental initiatives under the Biden Administration and a sweeping directive to achieve American dominance in mining, energy extraction and facilities such as pipelines.
Levin sent that email as directed. Then sent another — this time from his personal account:
” … Yes, this is disappointing. Yes, this is frustrating. However, it is not unexpected. Therefore, I am moving on from those emotions to see opportunity in this challenge. This work is too important to die … And so, inspired by Lenny Kravitz (1991): I say, “It ain’t over ’til [we say] it’s over.”
In the works now is completion of a new report. It will still be comprehensive, peer-reviewed, and the first report of its kind. Originally scheduled to be released in 2026, the report will still make that deadline, Levin said, or maybe even beat it, now that every chapter doesn’t have to be cleared by a government agency.
The University of Washington has more scientists participating in the work than any other academic institution.
The report is not just a species count; it takes stock of biodiversity and species, but there also are chapters on nature and the economy, bright spots in conservation and restoration, environmental justice and equity, nature and climate change, and even nature and cultural heritage, delving into people’s perception and understanding and value for the natural world.
Levin said he has been amazed at the outpouring of support to continue the work. After a story on the ordered cancellation ran in The New York Times, his University of Washington inbox was stuffed with hundreds of emails, Levin said. Many publishers have since stepped forward, interested to bring out the report, as have academic journals, wanting to publish portions of the report within their discipline. Copy editors, artists and others have volunteered to help.
The assessment was authorized as part of the U.S. Global Change Research Program, created by Congress in 1990 to assist the nation and world in understanding, assessing, predicting and responding to human-induced and natural processes of global change. The first National Nature Assessment was intended to examine the status, observed trends and future projections of America’s lands, waters, wildlife, biodiversity and ecosystems and the benefits they provide, including connections to the economy, public health, equity, climate mitigation and adaptation, and national security.
An outline of the report has already been published in the Federal Register.
“It’s a different game, but the overall project remains the same,” Levin said, “to really think about the status and trends and what the future looks like for American nature and why it matters in people’s lives today.”
Howard Frumkin is professor emeritus of environmental and occupational health sciences at the University of Washington School of Public Health, where he served as dean from 2010-16.
Frumkin, lead author of a chapter on nature and human health and well-being, said he was surprised the report was pulled, as nature is not intrinsically political. “Americans love their natural heritage, people love the outdoors, and they love it regardless of politics.”
Canceling the report just made him and others all the more determined to bring out this essential work, Frumkin said.
Devon Peña is a professor of American ethnic studies and anthropology at the University of Washington where his work crosses disciplines to examine the relationship between people and nature.
His contributions in the report explore how humans are in a way like beavers: ecosystem engineers who as they disturb the earth also can become creators of habitat.
“Humans are not always nasty destroyers of the earth,” he said. “We need to stop falling into the trap of the binary dichotomies of humans over here, nature over there,” Peña said. “Nature is neither a commodity nor a wilderness, it is our home it’s where we live, work, play, worship and eat.”
The work stoppage is just a restart and nothing unfamiliar in real life, noted Peña, 70. “We have been here before, and for Indigenous people like myself this has been going on for 500 years, and we have had a chance to develop capacity to survive.”
Josh Lawler, a professor of environmental and forest sciences at the University of Washington, is an author on the chapter about frameworks and approaches. It’s crucial the assessment still be published, he said, because it will help people understand what we get from the natural world, how we depend on it, and what state it is in. “It’s like going to the doctor,” he said of the assessment. After all, “We do depend on these natural systems for our survival.”
Pooja Tandon is a pediatrician and an associate professor at the UW School of Medicine, where her research focuses on promoting physical activity and outdoor time as a way to promote health and well-being.
“I was shocked that it was entirely shut down,” she said of the report. “To me a national nature assessment does not seem a partisan topic, a lot of my work focuses on nature and outdoor time as a way of supporting health, especially for children but for all people, that does not seem partisan, especially given the issues of our time, too much screen time, being too sedentary, isolation.”
For so many of these challenges the solution is access to nature and time outdoors, she noted.
“I feel committed to continuing this work, in many ways I feel even more resolved.”
