When the Supreme Court decided that the district courts had jurisdiction over challenges to the Obama administration WOTUS rule
, I described it as a victory of the “give me a break” doctrine of statutory interpretation over the “just plain nuts” theory. I also noted that the Supreme Court had the luxury of ignoring the chaos that would ensue.
Whatever one may think of the merits of the competing theories,… More
Earlier this month, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals stayed EPA’s disapproval of the Texas and Oklahoma regional haze state implementation plans, as well as EPA’s promulgation of its own federal implementation plan. The opinion is a thorough rejection of EPA’s decision. Although this was only a stay order, I would rate EPA’s likelihood of ultimately prevailing on the merits as approximately zero. There are a number of significant take-aways from the decision: