The Endangered Species Coalition is a left-of-center environmentalist and animal liberation coalition. The coalition is comprised of leaders from environmentalist non-profits, executive agency employees, university professors, representatives of environmentalist-aligned investment firms, and consulting firms. ¹

The Endangered Species Coalition advances its objectives through lobbying and public educational programs. ² Endangered Species Coalition has opposed the use of zero carbon nuclear energy. ³

Finances

In 2018 the Endangered Species Coalition received $1,177,058 in grants⁴ and possessed $710,697 in net assets after accounting for all liabilities. ⁵

Donors

Endangered Species Coalition institute has received funding from several institutional environmentalist and other left-of-center institutional donors. In 2018, they included:

• The Wood Tiger Fund provided the Endangered Species Coalition with a $125,000 grant. ⁶
• The Firedoll Foundation provided the Endangered Species Coalition with a $25,000 grant. ⁷
• org, the corporate foundation of the environmentalist-aligned sportswear brand Patagonia, provided Endangered Species Coalition with a $20,000 grant. ⁷
• The Center for Large Landscape Conservation provided the Endangered Species Coalition with a $18,000 grant. ⁶
• The Horne Family Foundation provided the Endangered Species Coalition with a $15,000 grant. ⁷
• The Morgan Stanley Global Impact Fund provided the Endangered Species Coalition with a $15,000 grant. ⁶
• The Orange County Community Foundation provided Endangered Species Coalition with a $65,000 grant. ⁶
• The Rose Foundation for Communities and the Environment provided Endangered Species Coalition with a $15,000 grant. ⁶

Activist Training Lab

The Activist Training Lab is a yearlong program designed by the Endangered Species Coalition to instruct its participants on environmentalism and animal liberation. ⁸ The program’s list of educational objectives includes leadership development, developing recruitment skills to spread the message of the organization, media literacy, and lobbying. ⁹

The Activist Training Lab is headed by Sarah Starman,⁹ a recipient of the Green Corps Environmental Organizing Fellowship, a paid fellowship that trains college graduates in environmentalist activism and assists with finding permanent employment within the environmentalist non-profit network. ¹⁰

Campaigns

Pesticide Report

The Endangered Species Coalition compiles an anti-pesticide list of 10 species that have been impacted by pesticides. ¹¹

One of the species listed is the Salado Salamander (Eurycea chisholmensis)—a salamander species that according to the report scientists know little about, being unaware of the salamander’s existence until the year 2000. ¹² Only 100 such salamanders have been identified over the past five years. ¹²

Southern Resident Orcas

The Southern Resident Orcas project seeks to destroy four dams placed along Snake River, a major river in the Pacific Northwest. ¹³

The Endangered Species Coalition seeks to breach these dams to increase the number of chinook salmon in Snake River, which will in turn increase the amount of food available for Southern Resident Orcas. ¹³

Western Slope Connectivity Project

The Western Slope Connectivity Project opposes population growth and business development in Colorado. arguing that such expansion threatens the wildlife habitat of animals. The Endangered Species Coalition supports this position by arguing that Colorado’s $62.5 billion tourism industry is dependent upon its wildlife. ¹⁴

Wildlife Corridors – Pennsylvania

The Wildlife Corridors – Pennsylvania project seeks to create and maintain wildlife corridors, which connect otherwise separate habitats, to increase the survival rate of threatened and endangered species in the connected habitats. ¹⁵

Opposition to Nuclear Energy

Endangered Species Coalition was one of more than 600 co-signing organizations on a January 2019 open letter to Congress titled “Legislation to Address the Urgent Threat of Climate Change.” The signatories declared their support for new laws to bring about “100 percent decarbonization” of the transportation sector but denounced nuclear power as an example of “dirty energy” that should not be included in any legislation promoting the use of so-called “renewable energy.” ³

Nuclear power plants produce no carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gas emissions, and as of 2021 accounted for 19 percent of American electricity production—the largest source of zero carbon electricity in the United States. ¹⁶ An October 2018 proposal from The Nature Conservancy noted that zero-carbon nuclear plants produced 7.8 percent of total world energy output and recommended reducing carbon emissions by increasing nuclear capacity to 33 percent of total world energy output. ¹⁷

Leadership

The Endangered Species Coalition was created in 2001. ¹⁸ Leda Huta is executive director of the Endangered Species Coalition; she is a co-founder of EcoWomen, a social group and brainstorming organization for women in the environmentalist movement. ¹⁹

1. “Board” Endangered Species Coalition. https://www.endangered.org/about-us/board/
2. “About Us” Endangered Species Coalition. https://www.endangered.org/about-us/
3. “Group letter to Congress urging Green New Deal passage.” Earthworks. January 10, 2019. Accessed July 27, 2023. https://www.earthworks.org/publications/group-letter-to-congress-urging-green-new-deal-passage/
4. Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax” Guidestar.org. Accessed July 21, Part I, Line 12.
5. Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax” Guidestar.org. Accessed July 21, Part I, Line 22.
6. Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax” Guidestar.org. Accessed July 21, Part II.
7. Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax” Guidestar.org. Accessed July 21, Part XV.
8. “Campaigns – Activist Training Lab” Endangered Species Coalition. https://www.endangered.org/activist-training-lab/  
9. “Campaigns – Activist Training Lab” Endangered Species Coalition. https://www.endangered.org/activist-training-lab/
10. “Green Corps: Environmental Organizing Fellowship” Initiative for Global Environmental Leadership – University of Pennsylvania (Wharton). https://whartonigelupenn.wordpress.com/2018/09/17/green-corps-environmental-organizing-fellowship/
11. “Campaigns – Annual Top 10 Report” Endangered Species Coalition. https://www.endangered.org/campaigns/annual-top-ten-report/
12. Poisoned – 10 American species imperiled by pesticides” Endangered Species Coalition. https://docs.google.com/viewerng/viewer?url=http://www.endangered.org/cms/assets/uploads/2019/11/ESC2019-1.pdf&hl=en
13. “Campaigns – Southern Resident Orcas” https://www.endangered.org/campaigns/southern-resident-orcas/
14. “Campaigns – Western Slope Connectivity Project” https://www.endangered.org/western-slope-connectivity-project/
15. “Campaigns – Wildlife Corridors-Pennsylvania” https://www.endangered.org/wildlife-corridors-pennsylvania/
16. “Nuclear explained.” U.S. Energy Information Administration. Accessed July 25, 2023. https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/nuclear/us-nuclear-industry.php
17. “The Science of Sustainability.” The Nature Conservancy. October 13, 2018. Accessed July 25, 2023. https://www.nature.org/en-us/what-we-do/our-insights/perspectives/the-science-of-sustainability/
18. Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax” Guidestar.org. Accessed July 21, Section L.
19. Ritterstein, Alyssa. “How DC EcoWomen Started: Story by EcoWomen Co-Founder Leda Huta” ecowomen. April, 6 2019. Accessed July 21, 2020. https://dc.ecowomen.org/?p=8496