Endangered Deference Doctrine Could End EPA's Streak Of Court Losses

摘要

EPA could soon end its losing streak in litigation over rollbacks of Obama-era policies as lawsuits shift from procedural challenges to fights over the merits of rules on which courts often defer to the agency, but that outcome faces a growing threat from conservative federal judges who are looking to narrow or even scrap such deference. "In the first couple of years of the administration, they tried to move way too fast with a crew of people who didn't know how to dot all the I's and cross all the T's, and that got them into a lot of trouble," said Robert Percival, director of the University of Maryland Carey School of Law's Environmental Law Program, in a Feb. 21 interview with Inside EPA. He was referring to early Trump administration moves to delay or undo Obama EPA policies that critics successfully challenged in court cases that focused on procedural flaws in those efforts.