Last month, the Trump administration announced a major overhaul to the Endangered Species Act.

The administration and congressional Republicans have said the changes improve the law.

Last month, seven environmental groups filed another lawsuit that also challenged the revisions.

Seventeen states from California to Massachusetts filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration Wednesday in order to block a significant rollback of the Endangered Species Act.

Last month, the Trump administration announced a major overhaul to the Endangered Species Act that it said would reduce regulations. The new rules begin taking effect Thursday.

The administration's changes ended blanket protections for animals newly deemed threatened and allowed federal authorities for the first time to take into account the economic cost of protecting a particular species.

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“As we face the unprecedented threat of a climate emergency, now is the time to strengthen our planet’s biodiversity, not to destroy it,” California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, who led the coalition that filed the suit, said in a statement. “The only thing we want to see extinct are the beastly policies of the Trump administration putting our ecosystems in critical danger.”

"We’re coming out swinging to defend this consequential law – humankind and the species with whom we share this planet depend on it,” Becerra said.

Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson called it “death by a thousand cuts” for the law.

Related:Environmental groups sue Trump administration over changes to Endangered Species Act

In addition to the 17 states, the lawsuit was also brought by the City of New York and the District of Columbia, and was filed against the U.S. Departments of the Interior and Commerce.

The Endangered Species Act protects more than 1,600 species in the USA and its territories. Since being enacted in 1973, it has saved 99% of listed species from extinction and has brought species like the gray wolf and bald eagle back from the brink.

Last month, seven environmental groups filed another lawsuit that also challenged the revisions to the Endangered Species Act.

The administration and congressional Republicans have said the changes improve the law. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said they ease “the regulatory burden on the American public” without sacrificing conservation goals.

In a comment about the environmental groups' lawsuit last month, the Department of the Interior told USA TODAY that "it is unsurprising that those who repeatedly seek to weaponize the Endangered Species Act – instead of use it as a means to recover imperiled species – would choose to sue.

"We will see them in court, and we will be steadfast in our implementation of this important act with the unchanging goal of conserving and recovering species."

Contributing: The Associated Press