Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to combat climate change
The Supreme Court on Thursday sharply cut back the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to reduce the carbon output of existing power plants, a blow to the Biden administration’s plans for combating climate change.
The vote was 6 to 3, with Chief Justice John Roberts writing for the court’s conservatives.
“Capping carbon dioxide emissions at a level that will force a nationwide transition away from the use of coal to generate electricity may be a sensible ‘solution to the crisis of the day,’ ” Roberts wrote, referring to a court precedent. “But it is not plausible that Congress gave EPA the authority to adopt on its own such a regulatory scheme.”
Justice Elena Kagan, writing for the dissenters, countered: “The Court appoints itself — instead of Congress or the expert agency — the decisionmaker on climate policy. I cannot think of many things more frightening.”
The decision risks putting the United States even further off track from President Joe Biden’s goal of running the U.S. power grid on clean energy by 2035 — and making the entire economy carbon-neutral by 2050.
With higher seas, fiercer wildfires and other consequences of climate change apparent, the world is already in unprecedented territory. Biden hoped to lead by example to convince other countries to cut emissions and help the world keep warming under 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit.
Now such diplomacy has become more difficult for Biden, especially as countries scramble for new sources of oil and gas after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Biden said the ruling “is another devastating decision that aims to take our country backwards. While this decision risks damaging our nation’s ability to keep our air clean and combat climate change, I will not relent in using my lawful authorities to protect public health and tackle the climate crisis.”
The court was considering the powers granted by the Clean Air Act, which was written decades ago, before climate change was widely recognized as a worldwide crisis.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., praised the ruling.
“The Court has undone illegal regulations issued by the EPA without any clear congressional authorization and confirmed that only the people’s representatives in Congress — not unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats — may write our nation’s laws,” McConnell said in a statement.
The United States is the world’s second-biggest annual emitter of greenhouse gases, and is responsible for a greater portion of historical emissions than any other nation.
In other rulings released Thursday, the Supreme Court:
⏩ Ruled for the Biden administration on a controversial immigration policy, saying it had the authority to reverse a Trump-era initiative that requires asylum seekers to remain in Mexico while their cases are reviewed in U.S. courts.
Lower courts had gone too far in requiring President Joe Biden to keep in place policies that intruded on his ability to carry out the nation’s immigration procedures and foreign policy, wrote Chief Justice John Roberts. It was a rare win for the administration at the Supreme Court this term, and for the court’s liberal members, who found themselves in the majority.
The vote was 5-4, with Roberts writing for himself and fellow conservative justice Brett Kavanaugh, plus Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan from the left.
At issue were the Migrant Protection Protocols put in place by the Trump administration. Better known as the “Remain in Mexico” policy, it requires some asylum seekers who enter the country illegally, mainly from Central and South America, to return to Mexico while they await a hearing. President Donald Trump said the program was necessary to curb what his administration characterized as a flood of meritless asylum claims by migrants seeking to be released into the United States.
⏩ Left in place New York’s coronavirus vaccine requirement for health-care workers that drew a challenge over its lack of a religious exemption.
⏩ Said it will consider in the court’s next term what would be a fundamental change in the way federal elections are conducted, giving state legislatures sole authority to set the rules for contests even if their actions violated state constitutions and resulted in extreme partisan gerrymandering for congressional seats.