The ESA passed under a Republican president as a bipartisan consensus, 355-4, but in years since it has become highly controversial. As the cases above show, the act enables tiny fish and an array of other microfauna (or the environmental campaign groups acting on their behalf) to stand in the way of billions of dollars of capital.
The people in the place a re being saved by legislation that prevents other people from hurting the endangered species in the place.
Without the laws, other people elsewhere would be taking the resources and hurting the people in the place.
The Environmental Safety Act is saving people more than our actual laws (ostensibly for saving people) are, at least in some cases.