Streamline NMFS to end overlap with the Fish and Wildlife Service

Attempted

Printed page 676 21. Department of Commerce

“Overlap exists between the National Marine Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Overly simplified, the NMFS handles saltwater species while the Fish and Wildlife Service focuses on fresh water. The goals of these two agencies should be streamlined.”

What has happened

Apr 1, 2026 Attempted
The FY2027 Budget repeated and sharpened the proposal — 'The Budget consolidates and streamlines the regulatory oversight of these two permitting programs into a single program at DOI' — and the NOAA Congressional Justification carries the transfer of the Office of Protected Resources' ESA and MMPA activities as a budget line. Requested twice, not enacted; NMFS and FWS still divide the work as before.
- Budget of the U.S. Government, Fiscal Year 2027 — Department of Commerce
  Primary Executive branch Apr 1, 2026
- NOAA FY2027 Congressional Justification
  Primary Executive branch Apr 1, 2026
Jan 23, 2026 Attempted
Congress did not enact the transfer: P.L. 119-74 funds NOAA's Operations, Research, and Facilities account whole, including the Office of Protected Resources.
- P.L. 119-74, Commerce-Justice-Science and related appropriations, FY2026
  Primary Congress Jan 23, 2026
May 2, 2025 Attempted
The FY2026 discretionary request proposed moving the Endangered Species Act and Marine Mammal Protection Act functions of NOAA Fisheries to the Department of the Interior's Fish and Wildlife Service — the overlap the Quote names, addressed by consolidation at Interior rather than by streamlining the two agencies' goals.
- OMB, FY2026 Discretionary Budget Request (Vought to Collins)
  Primary Executive branch May 2, 2025
- NOAA FY2026 Congressional Justification
  Primary Executive branch Jun 1, 2025

Research log

What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence

Research notes

§3b: a President’s Budget request is a formal administration request, so a proposed transfer is attempted, and Congress’s refusal is recorded in the note of the same event rather than as a second event.

The Quote asks that the goals of NMFS and FWS “be streamlined” where they overlap. The instrument the administration chose is narrower than the Quote and points at the same overlap: consolidating ESA and MMPA permitting — the clearest overlap between the two services — into one program at Interior. The FY2027 NOAA Justification’s own words were read at line 8081 of the extracted text: “The Budget proposes to transfer NMFS’ ESA and MMPA functions to the Department of the Interior’s U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.”

This shares an instrument with #1876 (major, partial) but is a different ask: #1876 is about rewriting the ESA and MMPA regulations, which happened; this is about who administers them, which has not.

Action: other
Object: National Marine Fisheries Service
ID: 1874