Climate Politics/Capitol Light (25)

                      Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
 
Volume 1                                                          September 4, 2019                                                                Issue 25

Get a move on. Government lawyers today urged the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to expedite consideration of legal challenges to the EPA regulation, which replaces the Obama-era Clean Power Plan.

The move could mean the Trump administration defends the ACE rule in the Supreme Court before the end of the president's term.

• How long it takes for ACE cases to be finally resolved by the High Court is a critical part of what the future will hold, should the Democrats retake the White House.
• Trump came into office before the CPP could be decided by the Supreme Court, allowing him to rescind and replace Obama’s plan, and to ask for dismissal of West Virginia v. EPA—the name under which most of the cases were consolidated.
• Had the case been decided in favor of the CPP—by a court without Justices Gorsuch and Kennedy—it would have been much harder for Trump and company to attack because it would have been an in force regulation.
• Beyond the CPP, a positive outcome in the case would have created a strong and on-point precedent that would make it harder for a conservative judiciary to ignore.

For an additional discussion of what a Democratic administration will be facing after four years of Trump check here for my series on Erasing Trump’s Climate Legacy.

Read More