How do I submit a public comment on Removal of Gila Chub From the List of Endangered?

The public comment window for this decision closed on September 25, 2026. The record of what was at stake stays on this page.

When is the public comment deadline for Removal of Gila Chub From the List of Endangered?

The comment window closed on September 25, 2026.

Do public comments actually change federal decisions?

Yes, when they are substantive. Agencies are legally required to read and respond to substantive comments before finalizing a rule, and specific personal comments about real places and real uses carry far more weight than identical form letters. Courts have overturned rules when agencies ignored substantive comments.

Stop delisting the Gila chub from federal protection

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Record closed September 25, 2026

Gila chub (Bureau of Land Management photo) — Comments closed September 25
Stop delisting the Gila chub from federal protection
Fish and Wildlife Service

What: Federal protection for the Gila chub, a native Southwest fish, could be permanently removed.
Where: The notice names no place; see the agency’s own words under Case.
How much: The Gila chub, a freshwater fish native to Arizona and New Mexico, faces loss of its Endangered Species Act protections.
Decided: Comments closed September 25, 2026. No decision document is on file yet.Date from Federal Register ↗, read October 29, 2026.

Where these four lines come from

WhatOur plain-English read of the Federal Register 2026-18470 ↗. Check it against the agency’s own words under Case.
WhereThe places and states the notice names, as PLAN read them.
How muchThe first sentence of our What’s at risk read of the notice; the whole read is under Case.
DecidedSeptember 25, 2026, from Federal Register, the notice's DATES field (federalregister.gov API) ↗: “Comments submitted electronically using the Federal eRulemaking Portal (see ADDRESSES, below) must be received by 11:59 pm eastern time on the closing date, and comments submitted by US mail must be received by that date to ensure consideration.”. Read October 29, 2026. The decision document is the one on file in PLAN’s record.
Read from PLAN’s record November 9, 2026.

Who signed this

Brian Nesvik

Director, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

A person signed this, not an agency. The window has closed and the signature stands, which is exactly when accountability matters.

What to say

Short is better. You are asking Director Nesvik to answer for a decision their office made.

My name is [your name] and I'm calling from [your city and state]. Brian Nesvik, Director, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, signed the decision on Stop delisting the Gila chub from federal protection. I'm asking that office to answer for it publicly. Please record that I called and tell me what the office intends to do.

Official channels only, about this decision. No personal phone numbers, no home addresses, no personal social accounts, and nothing abusive. The point is to make the office answer, and an abusive call is the one thing that lets it off the hook.

What the proposal said, and what the decision did

No figure from the proposal has been checked against the decision on this fight yet. What the record does hold is the issues ledger below.

No decision document is on PLAN’s record for this fight yet. When the agency’s decision lands, what it answered goes here.

PLAN's read: high threat

A language model's read of the agency's notice, not an agency rating and not an editor's finding. It’s read from the official notice ↗, and it isn’t a grade.

Federal protection for the Gila chub, a native Southwest fish, could be permanently removed.

What’s at risk

The Gila chub, a freshwater fish native to Arizona and New Mexico, faces loss of its Endangered Species Act protections. Without that status, federal agencies and permit holders face weaker legal obligations to protect the species and its habitat.

If this goes through

If the delisting is finalized, the Gila chub loses the legal safeguards that have driven its recovery, and restoring those protections would require starting the listing process over.

Our plain-English read of the official notice ↗. Check it against the agency’s own words below.

The agency’s case, tested

What the agency argues, and whether its own record backs it

4
Not fully backed

The Fish and Wildlife Service finds that listing the Lower Colorado River roundtail chub as threatened or endangered isn't warranted, and it's considering removing the endangered Gila chub from the federal list because a 2017 taxonomic revision folded the Gila chub into roundtail chub.

“Therefore, we hereby announce that we are considering issuing a proposed rule to remove Gila chub (Gila intermedia) from the List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife at 50 CFR 17.11(h).”
Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking

EffectsNot fully backedMost roundtail chub populations in the Lower Colorado River basin are stable or increasing even though nonnative fish occur across much of the range.
The Summary of Finding section says conservation efforts have stabilized most existing populations, and that since 2004, 20 populations have been introduced, reintroduced, or expanded, with at least 37 augmentations in 14 streams. It also gives 83 populations over 1,146 miles of stream and occupancy of around 34 percent of the historical range, with extirpation from two of nine major basins. It doesn't say how many populations are stable, increasing or declining, or how many of the 83 are introduced ones.
The agency’s words, the record +Hide the words
The agency says
“Most of these populations are stable or increasing, despite the co-occurrence of nonnative species across much of the range.”
Summary of Finding
Elsewhere in the same document
“Currently, we estimate that the Lower Colorado River basin roundtail chub DPS occupies around 34 percent of its historical range in the basin and has been extirpated from two of the nine major basins it historically occupied.”
Summary of Finding
“Within its current range, 83 populations occupy a cumulative total of 1,146 miles (1,845 kilometers) of stream length.”
Summary of Finding
EffectsNot fully backedRoundtail chub populations will stay resilient and diverse enough to cope with changing conditions in the future.
The notice says there's variation in ecological settings and genetic diversity across the range that represents potential adaptive capacity. It says Federal and State agencies and Tribal nations have been carrying out conservation measures that stabilized most existing populations. It also says the agency anticipates these efforts will continue. Every modeled scenario included a positive effect of management, but the notice doesn't identify any funding, agreement or commitment that keeps that management going. It only encourages agencies to continue.
The agency’s words, the record +Hide the words
The agency says
“Overall, these results suggest that populations of this DPS will continue to be adequately resilient and retain sufficient intraspecific diversity to cope with changing environments in the future.”
Summary of Finding
Elsewhere in the same document
“These efforts have stabilized most existing populations and expanded the species’ distribution through translocations.”
Summary of Finding
“We encourage local agencies and stakeholders to continue cooperative monitoring and conservation efforts.”
New Information
ScienceNot fully backedThreats aren't concentrated in any part of the population's range at a biologically meaningful scale.
The notice says nonnative species co-occur across much of the range and that surviving populations are widely distributed, which points to widespread rather than concentrated threats. Still, it states the no-concentration conclusion without basin-by-basin threat data. It notes extirpation from two of nine major basins but doesn't show how threats compare among the remaining basins.
The agency’s words, the record +Hide the words
The agency says
“Based on the best available information, we found no concentration of threats in any portion of the DPS’s range at a biologically meaningful scale.”
Summary of Finding
Elsewhere in the same document
“These influences include nonnative species and alterations to the hydrological regime, which have reduced the distribution and abundance of roundtail chub in the past and continue to impact populations today.”
Summary of Finding
Show 1 more claim +Show fewer
- ScienceNot fully backedLittle Colorado River roundtail chub are discrete but not significant, so they were excluded from the petitioned population.
  The notice explains that genetic research places Little Colorado River chub in the same lineage as Upper basin chub, which is its reason for treating them separately. However, it cites no study for this, and it gives no reasoning here for the finding that they aren't significant. Instead it refers readers to the species assessment form, which isn't in this text. The original petition included the Little Colorado River.
  The agency’s words, the record +Hide the words
  The agency says
  “Roundtail chub in the Little Colorado River do meet the threshold of discrete under the policy, but not the standard for significant.”
  Summary of Finding
  Elsewhere in the same document
  “This research has also found that roundtail chub from the Little Colorado River, traditionally geographically placed in the Lower Colorado River basin, belong to the same genetic lineage as roundtail chub in the Upper Colorado River basin.”
  Summary of Finding
  “The original petition to list roundtail chub in the Lower Colorado River basin included populations found in the Bill Williams, Gila, and Little Colorado River basins, which are located in Arizona and New Mexico.”
  Summary of Finding

How this was read

Read from the agency’s own notice ↗, all 4 pages. Every quote is checked word for word against it, a claim marked contradicted stands on a quote from the same document, and a second reading argued the agency’s side of every verdict before it was published. The verdicts are our reading; the quotes are the agency’s. A court can set aside agency action it finds “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law” (5 U.S.C. 706(2)(A) ↗), which is why these gaps are worth putting in the record.

In the agency’s own words

We, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service), are reopening the public comment period on our June 17, 2025, proposed rule to remove the Gila chub (Gila intermedia) from the Federal List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife. We are taking this action to allow all interested parties an additional opportunity to comment on the proposed rule. Comments previously submitted on the proposed rule need not be resubmitted and will be fully considered in our development of the final rule.

Federal Register 2026-18470 ↗