Trump’s Border Wall, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and Separation of Powers
U.S. Court of Appeals Rules Unconstitutional Trump Administration's Diversion of $2.5 Billion in Congressionally-Appropriated DOD Funds for Border Wall Construction
Late last week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit struck down the Trump Administration's attempted diversion of $2.5 billion in federal funds Congress had appropriated for the Department of Defense. The Trump Administration did so in order to finance President Trump's proposed, controversial border wall at a level Congress had expressly declined to approve. That diversion, ruled the appellate court, violates the Appropriations Clause of the U.S. Con...
CONTINUE READINGTowards an equitable microgrid policy
The California Public Utilities Commission's recent decision is a first step to grid resiliency for communities of color and low-income communities
The 2020 fire season has already started, and we cannot repeat the mistakes of past fire seasons. PG&E recently pled guilty to 84 counts of manslaughter after 84 people were killed when a derelict PG&E transmission line sparked the 2018 Camp Fire. The 2019 fire seasons saw widespread public safety power shutoffs (PSPS events), most notably PG&E’s seven-day outage in late October, over the course of which 941,217 customer meters--serving nearly 3 million peo...
CONTINUE READINGA small bit of good news for the role of science and expertise
EPA decides not to appeal court ruling vacating directive excluding agency grantees from advisory boards
There's not much good news about US environmental governance (or, really, US governance at all) these days. So it seems worth noting when even a small morsel shows up. Today, EPA announced that it will not appeal a decision from the District Court for the Southern District of New York vacating a 2017 agency directive which forbade appointment of EPA grantees to advisory boards. EPA had touted the policy as a way to avoid conflicts of interest. Prominent science organi...
CONTINUE READINGHappy Birthday, Chevron Doctrine!
The Chevron doctrine has been a keystone of administrative law. But now it’s under siege.
Thirty-six years ago today, the Supreme Court decided the Chevron case. The case gives leeway to agencies when their governing statutes are unclear or have gaps. It’s probably the most frequently cited Supreme Court opinion ever. But now the Chevron doctrine is under fire from conservatives, who used to be its strongest advocates. Here’s how the doctrine works. The Chevron doctrine is a rule about court review of agency actions that many scholars consider cent...
CONTINUE READINGThe “American family” in crisis: Colonialism, COVID-19 risk, and climate vulnerability
The fight for racial justice must include a reckoning with US imperialism.
The recent spotlight on anti-Black violence has awoken many white Americans to an uncomfortable truth: that underneath its rhetoric of equality, the United States is a fundamentally racist country. The disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on U.S. communities of color underscores this fact. The pandemic also reveals a lesser known but equally uncomfortable truth: that underneath its rhetoric of liberty and justice for all, the U.S. is not only a racist country, but a racis...
CONTINUE READINGThe Scourge of ERRD-16
Evident-Resistant Reasoning DIsorder can strike without warning.
A stubborn disagreement. A misguided tweet or facebook post. A lame remark. Those things can be normal behaviors. But they could be signs of something much more serious: a syndrome called Evidence-Resistant Reasoning Disorder or ERRD-16. This disorder has expanded explosively since a mutated form was introduced by a super-spreader in 2016. This super-spreader is thought to have transmitted the disease directly or indirectly to tens of millions of Americans, including ...
CONTINUE READINGEnvironmentalists v. Cost-Benefit Analysis: What Does the Future Hold?
For now, at least, environmentalists and economists are aligned in criticizing Trump's rollbacks. Will this alliance last?
If it’s true that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” environmentalists might want to take another look at cost-benefit analysis. The Trump Administration is certainly doing its best to gut economic analysis of its rollbacks. Both economists and environmentalists are resisting. Is this an alliance of convenience or will it be the start of a beautiful friendship? Even a month into his presidency, Trump’s approach was clear: cost-benefit analysis, but with...
CONTINUE READINGA Black Staffer’s Noisy Exit from a Green NGO
Resignation letter at Union of Concerned Scientists calls out dominant white culture in large environmental organizations
On this Juneteenth, it is fitting to lift up and celebrate a recent, significant emancipatory act that until now has ramified little beyond the niche trade press. I refer here to the dramatic early June exit of 26-year-old Black staffer ruth tyson from the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), via letter e-mailed to all staff and also posted on Ms. tyson’s Facebook page. No ordinary missive, this 17-page document—An Open Letter to the Union of Concerned Scientists: On...
CONTINUE READINGLessons from the DACA Ruling
The Court’s ruling could have important implications for environmental cases.
The Supreme Court’s ruling in Department of Homeland Security v. UC Regents was great news for 700,000 “Dreamers” who would otherwise face deportation. It also has important implications for administrative law — and for environmental law cases in particular. Here are three main takeaways. Requiring Reasoned Explanation. Chief Justice John Roberts reinforced the principle that agencies must give reasoned explanations for their orders. As Roberts put it, i...
CONTINUE READINGA New Report on Governing Climate Geoengineering
I suggest steps toward global governance of carbon dioxide removal and solar geoengineering
A new report on the governance of climate geoengineering -- that is, carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and solar geoengineering (or solar radiation modification, SRM) -- has been released. International Governance Issues on Climate Engineering: Information for Policymakers was coordinated and issued by the International Risk Governance Center, edited by IRGC's Marie-Valentine Florin, and commissioned by the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment. Its four chapters were...
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