Florida Tech Bro Wants to Wipe Out a Bird’s Endangered Species Protection to Avoid Paying a Fee

Did you know that there are apparently only 15 species of birds that are fully endemic (which means only found there) to the continental United States? It’s an odd statistic, but one that makes sense when you consider both the range that birds can cover, and the fact that they’re not generally known for observing national borders or going through customs. In fact, the birds that are genuinely endemic to our country are often that way because their populations are small and contained in a specific area–endangered, even. The state of Florida has precisely one of these species, the Florida scrub jay, listed as “critically imperiled” by nonprofit conservation organization NatureServe. So naturally, there’s currently a dangerous alliance between a young Florida tech bro and a notorious conservative property rights group backed by ExxonMobil that is seeking to rob the poor scrub jay of any protection its remaining 7,000 or so living specimens possess, all because a homebuilder didn’t want to pay an extra conservation fee.

Granted, it wasn’t a small fee, but it was also part of the cost of building on that property that the man in question should absolutely have been aware of in advance. Now his legal team is dodging questions to that effect while taking aim at protections for the bird species that, if revoked, could establish precedent to also remove protections from more than 1,200 other species around the country–which is probably the true goal here. The attorneys involved have even attempted to summon the attention and support of President Donald Trump, that noted champion of the environment, less than a week after members of Trump’s cabinet approved an exception to the 1973 Endangered Species Act that would allow for new oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico regardless of how many species it drives to extinction. Gee, I wonder which side of the debate Trump would land on?

The tech bro in question, meanwhile, is a guy named Michael Colosi, a “young tech entrepreneur” who recently moved from New Jersey to Florida. He purchased a five-acre plot in the Gulf city of Punta Gorda in 2024, where he planned to build a house. But rather than pay Charlotte County the hefty, $118,000 conservation fee necessary because the land is in an area designated as a Florida scrub jay habitat, he instead decided to bring in lawyers from the dreaded Pacific Legal Foundation to represent him in a lawsuit against the county and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, arguing that the scrub jay does not deserve any protection under the Endangered Species Act.

Not only are Florida scrub-jays as a species more important than anything this person will ever do or be, any single, individual scrub-jay is more important. Even the dumbest meanest one.

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— Phineas (@phineas.bsky.social) Apr 1, 2026 at 11:34 PM

At first glance here, you might actually be tempted to accept that Colosi has a case, at least in terms of the fee being an onerous burden–there’s no denying that $118,000 is a lot to be charged from a conservation standpoint in order to build a house on a parcel of land that you’ve purchased. It’s logical to assume however, that Colosi would have known exactly what he was getting into when buying the land–the scrub jay protections have been in place since 2014, and the county property record for the parcel clearly notes, “Land value may be adjusted due to scrub jay habitat.” The entire showdown could have been avoided by the buyer simply choosing to build somewhere that wasn’t designated scrub jay habitat. Likewise, the money serves a concrete function: When someone builds in that habitat (and degrades it in the process), the state uses the funds to acquire and preserve more scrub jay territory to offset the loss. And that’s critically necessary for a species that has lost almost all of its territory and seen its population drop by an estimated 80-90% over the course of the last century. The Florida scrub jay’s trajectory has it pointed uncomfortably in the direction of extinction.

The birds are extremely popular within the state as well, both for birders and everyday Floridians, and there has been a concerted effort over the course of decades to make the scrub jay Florida’s new official state bird, replacing the Northern Mockingbird, which is spread all over the continent and is already the state bird of five other states. In fact, the scrub jay would probably already have the title if not for the impassioned hatred of a single, deeply influential person: 86-year-old NRA lead lobbyist Marion Hammer, who has for decades lobbied against the scrub jay with histrionic anger bordering on absurdist comedy. When it was noted, for instance, at a legislative hearing that the birds were beloved for their friendly nature and willingness to eat out of people’s hands, Hammer said that was actually a mark against them: “Begging for food isn’t sweet. It’s lazy and it’s a welfare mentality.” She has likewise disparaged the birds for being omnivorous, saying “they eat the eggs of other birds, that’s robbery and murder.” Naturally, she failed to note that the existing state bird, the Northern Mockingbird, also famously is an omnivore that will eat other bird eggs. But hey, when you’re a lobbyist for the NRA, you’re going to be very comfortable with the idea of a little hypocrisy. Still, I bet you didn’t wake up this morning thinking you’d see a bird species slammed as welfare queens, did you?

“The Florida scrub-jay has no commercial or economic value.”

Yeah that sounds like a pretty tech bro thing to say.

— Trevor Pierce (@continuumdesign.net) Apr 1, 2026 at 10:49 PM

The argument of the Pacific Legal Foundation in Colosi’s lawsuit is as novel as it is stupid: The PLF argues the Endangered Species Act cannot offer protection to scrub jays specifically because the birds only exist in one state, and federal protections by definition apply to multiple states rather than being able to regulate individual ones. In effect, they’re arguing that the bird is TOO ENDANGERED to be protected by the Endangered Species Act. If the court were to agree on this front, it could instantly wipe out legal protections for hundreds of other species in Florida and beyond–such as the critically endangered Florida panther, of which there are estimated to be only 200 individuals left in the wild, occupying 5% of its former range. The nonprofit Defenders of Wildlife put together a listing of all the endangered or imperiled species of animals and plants that exist in only one state, and the grand total is 1,229 different endangered species, all of which would be exposed to a damaging precedent here. A victory for one homeowner who didn’t want to pay a fee could quickly become the justification that allows developers to wipe out habitats from Maine to Hawaii, claiming they’re no longer beholden to federal protections. Simultaneously, the PLF is also arguing that the fee schedule for Charlotte County’s scrub jay protection is “excessive and arbitrary,” although county records show that hundreds of other residents have paid the fees without lodging any complaint.

Perhaps most dramatically, the legal filing of Colosi’s lawyers proclaims that the Florida scrub jay, as a species, has “no commercial or economic value.” Beyond that being a statement of breathtaking arrogance and hatred for the natural world, it’s demonstrably false both on an ecological front and an easily proven economic front. As the state’s only endemic bird, the Florida scrub jay is responsible for drawing literally thousands of birders to the state each year who are searching for it, an assertion that is easily backed up by data from bird-logging apps such as Cornell University’s Ebird. In fact, there might be no bird species in Florida that is more valuable from a tourism front, which is yet another reason the state should want to see them protected.

Suffice to say, the actual homeowner in Florida here is likely being used as a pawn in a greater game, with the ultimate intent being a way to weaken the broad protections of species and habitats established (with overwhelming support) by the 1973 Endangered Species Act. In a Presidential administration that has not been shy about trumpeting its utter disdain for the natural world and America’s biological diversity, even the most spurious lawsuit on this front must be taken seriously. The failure to do so could be yet another extinction.