We’re Supporting the New, Stronger NEPA Regulations Against a Court Challenge
Published Mar 27, 2024
Trump tried to gut one of the most important environmental laws of our time, and we challenged his administration's rollbacks in federal court. While our lawsuit remains paused, we're continuing to fight back.
Updated June 28, 2024
Over the past 50 years, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) has become the cornerstone of U.S. environmental law, and nations worldwide have replicated its model. NEPA requires federal agencies to consider the environmental impacts of their actions, creating a critical framework for the government to identify environmental risks and for the public to get involved. NEPA is meant to foster sound decision-making and transparency, and it has succeeded in providing opportunities for effective community organizing that can raise the alarm on and ultimately defeat many dangerous projects.
The Trump administration gutted long-standing NEPA regulations that required all federal agencies to consider indirect and cumulative impacts — like contributions to climate change — and required review of actions like federal financing of factory farms. Working with a broad coalition, we challenged this rollback in federal court.
Our litigation has been on pause as the Biden administration worked to restore the NEPA regulations. While the administration should have immediately rescinded the illegal Trump rules in their entirety, it remedied the worst of the rollbacks in May 2022 and finalized new, stronger NEPA regulations that emphasize climate change and environmental justice in May 2024. We participated throughout the process, advocating for strong rules that are protective of public health and the environment.
The final 2024 rule, which marked the completion of the Biden administration’s efforts to undo the damage of the Trump administration, is now being challenged in court by a coalition of industry-friendly states. We’ve joined partners and allies in moving to intervene in the case in support of the new regulations. The challengers seek to return to the Trump administration’s NEPA rules, which reduced this bedrock environmental law to nothing more than a paperwork exercise.
That’s unacceptable. We need to ensure that the new, more robust NEPA regulations stay in place, and that projects threatening to harm the climate, the environment, and communities get the scrutiny they deserve.
Food & Water Watch is represented by Earthjustice in these NEPA cases.
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