Trump Administration revokes Chesapeake Bay Protection and Restoration Executive Order.

Salisbury, Md. – On Wednesday, the White House announced an executive order to repeal Executive Order 13508, also known as the Chesapeake Bay Protection and Restoration executive order.

“Executive Order 13508 of May 12, 2009 (Chesapeake Bay Protection and Restoration), which has been in effect for 17 years, instituted a broad mandate for States and municipalities to contribute to improving the environmental health of the Chesapeake Bay, without providing clarity on how to implement that order’s requirements,” said a statement released by the White House.

Conservation groups say the new executive order leaves more questions than answers.

“Accountability and success over the last 15 years, seems to be something that is walked back in this executive order,” Chesapeake Bay Foundation President and CEO Hilary Harp Falk said during a press conference on Thursday. “And so we’re trying to understand what that could mean.”

The White House also alleges the order has led to harmful economic impacts by implementing stormwater management fees, commonly referred to as “rain taxes.”

However, Annie Richards, the riverkeeper for the Chester River located on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, said the decision will dissolve funding opportunities.

“Make no mistake, those funding reductions are going to impact farmers,” Richards said in an interview with WMDT. “They’re going to impact watermen. They’re going to impact local and small governments. And ultimately, they’re going to impact our ability to make progress on restoring waterways.”

However, Richards said that, though she is frustrated with the federal government, she is grateful that the state government has stepped up.

“Maryland’s Clean Water Act has always been stronger than the Federal Clean Water Act,” she said. Richards said that despite negative impacts to wetlands, streams and waterways at the national level due to the Supreme Court decision in Sackett vs. EPA, “Maryland hasn’t suffered that blow because of our kind of more comprehensive and protective definitions of waterways of the state.”

Maryland Department of Natural Resources Secretary Joshua Kurtz said the Clean Water Act acts as a “regulatory and statutory backstop” for the Bay Program.

“We’re continuing, you know, full bore with what we’ve all agreed to do together. And frankly, I don’t see this executive order disrupting that,” Kurtz said.

Chesapeake Legal Alliance Senior Attorney Evan Isaacson said that though it is a “legitimate fear” that less accountability from the federal government would lead to increased pollution into the bay and the rivers and streams that lead into it, he doesn’t think that states will allow it. However, he said things can change.

“Times change, resources change, political winds change in each of these states,” Isaacson said. “And when the state leadership in any one of these states decides, ‘yeah, we’re gonna take a hiatus here from enforcing the law.’ If you don’t have the feds there as a backstop, that has real consequences.”

The broadcast version of this story aired on Sept. 18, 2026.