On September 21, 2026, U.S. District Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. of the Southern District of Texas refused to block the Trump administration's Fish and Wildlife Service from giving Elon Musk's SpaceX 715 acres of the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge in exchange for 683 acres the company owns next to another refuge. The Service and SpaceX signed the exchange agreement on September 1, and according to the order they “expect to transfer title on September 22.” Bloomberg Law identifies Rodriguez as a Trump appointee.
The land the public is giving up is not marginal. The order describes it as coastal prairie, thornscrub, dunes and tidal flats that are “home to a host of animals, including several protected species,” and says “About 700 acres of the Property sit within the Palmito Ranch Battlefield National Historic Landmark,” where “in 1865 Union and Confederate soldiers fought the final land battle of the Civil War.” Once it owns the land, SpaceX intends “to expand the Massey Test Site toward the east and to construct a service road,” and “Long term, SpaceX intends to develop the Property with a mix of residential, industrial, and infrastructure projects.”
The idea predates Trump, but the decisions are his administration's. Quoting the agency's decision memo, the order says, “In 2023, in light of the fragmentation of Refuge lands, the Service began to consider a potential land exchange with SpaceX.” The Service sought approval in March 2026, received “over 25,000 comments (including from Plaintiffs), the majority of which opposed the Land Exchange,” and issued a final environmental assessment on June 1 that “remained substantively identical to the March 2026 draft.” On July 13, Fish and Wildlife Director Brian Nesvik, Trump's nominee, approved “proceeding with the proposed land exchange.” To rate the lands being swapped, the order notes, “the Service collaborated with SpaceX to develop a system for evaluating habitat quality.” Interior sent the deal to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees for a 30-day review, and “the record does not reflect any comment from or action by the Committee.” When the plan surfaced in December 2025, a Service spokesperson described it as a land exchange that “aligns with the administration's goals of strengthening American innovation, infrastructure and economic competitiveness.”
The ruling does not decide whether the swap is lawful. The plaintiffs, the Center for Biological Diversity, Save RGV, the Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas and the South Texas Environmental Justice Network, sued in June, arguing, as the Texas Tribune summarizes, that SpaceX's rocket tests were already degrading refuge land with debris. Rodriguez found that they “have not established a substantial likelihood that they have standing” and “offer relatively weak evidence of environmental harm in the immediate future.” He wrote that the court “shares some of Plaintiffs' skepticism that the modest expansion of the Massey Test Site and the planned additional access road represents a lynchpin to the company's enterprise-wide efforts,” but that an injunction would place “additional hardship on the company's ability to meet milestones and contractual obligations.” The case continues.
The Center for Biological Diversity says records it obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show internal planning “began as early as April 2025,” when the Service developed “the most expedited schedule possible” for the transfer, during Musk's tenure running the Department of Government Efficiency. That is a litigant's account of its own FOIA records. After the ruling, the Center's Laiken Jordahl said, “Trump and Burgum are gifting our public lands to SpaceX, clearing the way for bulldozers to tear into this wildlife refuge as soon as next week and turn a public treasure into a private payday,” and added, “This court order is not the final word.” For a similar public-land exchange, see The Administration Is Pressuring the Park Service to Hand a Strip of Yosemite to a Private Developer Who Wants a Road to His Resort Land.