Trump lawyers defend Obama EPA involvement in Mich. Permits

摘要

The Trump administration is pushing back on claims that Obama-era EPA officials overstepped when they got involved in wetlandspermitting in Michigan.In a brief submitted yesterday, Solicitor General Noel Francisco urged the Supreme Court to turn down a challenge to EPA'sinvolvement in a local agency's effort to build a road through undeveloped land in the state's Upper Peninsula.Though the conservative-leaning Pacific Legal Foundation frames the case as an example of federal overreach, Trump officials aresiding with their predecessors. And they're urging the justices to reject an argument that two recent Clean Water Act rulings from thehigh court leave EPA on the hook for more litigation.The dispute began in 2011 when the Marquette County Road Commission sought a permit to fill 25 acres of wetlands alongside aproposed road construction project that would link a local nickel and copper mine to its processing facility.