Keith Stretcher is a longtime West Texas attorney and former Justice on the Texas Eleventh Court of Appeals, appointed by Gov. Greg Abbott in 2019. He previously served as City Attorney for the cities of Midland and Sugar Land, and Interim City Attorney for Odessa.

What happened: On March 29, 2025, United States District Judge for the Western District of Texas, Midland-Odessa Division, David Counts, issued an 18-page opinion removing the Lesser Prairie Chicken from the list of species protected by the Federal Endangered Species Act (ESA). Judge Counts vacated the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (FWS) rule adopted in 2022, which provided federal protection for the Lesser Prairie Chicken.

Why it matters: Environmental groups had urged the judge to keep the 2022 listing in place and allow the FWS to rectify the alleged problems. Judge Counts determined that the procedural issues and defects in the 2022 listing were too numerous to justify a remand to the FWS, and the only option was to remove the Lesser Prairie Chicken from the ESA.

The big picture: The issues involving the Lesser Prairie Chicken have a long history. In 2014, the FWS first listed the Lesser Prairie Chicken as a threatened species under the ESA. This rule was vacated in 2015. In November 2022, the FWS established the northern population of the Lesser Prairie Chicken as threatened and the southern population of the species as endangered.

Judge Counts’ ruling found that no sufficient justification was made for the division of the species into two distinct population segments. The FWS listing identified the southern segment as extending from New Mexico to West Texas, while the northern area included Colorado, Kansas, and Oklahoma. The regulations were stricter in West Texas and New Mexico because the Lesser Prairie Chicken was considered endangered in this area.

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Go deeper: On Sept. 8, 2025, the Center for Biological Diversity and the Texas Campaign for the Environment filed an appeal in the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals located in New Orleans, asking the court to reverse Judge Counts’ decision. The appeal will be heard by a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which has 15 judges. As of this writing, the panel has not been publicly announced.

On Feb. 26, 2026, the FWS removed the Lesser Prairie Chicken from the federal list of endangered and threatened wildlife.

What’s next: The Lesser Prairie Chicken is currently delisted, but the FWS has begun a new status report for the Lesser Prairie Chicken. The FWS is initiating a 12-month petition fact-finding process. The FWS is accepting public comments through March 30.

Judge Counts was nominated for a Federal Judgeship by President Trump on Sept. 7, 2017. He received his judicial commission on Jan. 17, 2018.