The Trump administration on Tuesday exempted oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico from the Endangered Species Act after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said environmentalists' lawsuits threatened to hobble domestic energy supplies as the U.S. wages war against Iran . Critics said the move by the government's Endangered Species Committee could doom a rare whale species and harm other marine life. Nicknamed the "God Squad" by groups who say it can decide a species' fate, the committee