SCOTUS turns back EPA power expansion, Reeves reacts
The United States Supreme Court Thursday struck down the Biden administration’s effort to control greenhouse gasses, a ruling some said would deeply hamper the administration’s plan to fight climate change.
In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court ruled an appeals court decision interpreting the Clean Air Act to give the EPA more expansive power exceeded the agency’s authority.
The ruling came on the court’s final opinion release day of the current session.
The SCOTUS Blog’s opinion analysis has more details on today’s ruling in the case called West Virginia v. EPA.
Several Republican states and oil companies fought the administration’s moves to reinstate actions of the Obama administration to institute the Clean Power Plan, but that plan was put on hold by the courts in 2016. The Trump administration repealed the Clean Power Plan and put in its own program, but a circuit court decision last year vacated the replacement Affordable Clean Energy Rule, which had given states more discretion on the issue. It was that circuit court ruling from the District of Columbia that the Supreme Court ruled on.
Gov. Tate Reeves issued a statement after Thursday’s ruling, calling it a “resounding victory for checks and balances and the founding principles of our great nation.”
“It deals a serious loss to the seemingly never-ending attempts of the Biden administration and its mob of unelected and unaccountable woke bureaucrats to bypass Congress and make “laws” through the administrative state,” Reeves said. “He has attempted to circumvent the legislative process by having the EPA, among other agencies, enact broad rules that would effectively carry out that mission. The EPA attempted to pick energy winners and losers and force the subsidization of certain energy sources over others.”
Reeves said Biden was willing to sacrifice thousands of blue-collar jobs to pursue energy goals and the plan would have cost billions of dollars.
“My office was proud to stand with a number of states across the nation to push back against this unconstitutional government overreach and win this victory for every American ,” the governor said. “We’ll continue to do everything in our power to hold the Biden administration accountable.”
You can read the entire Supreme Court ruling here.
