Once again we see challenges to the progressives’ policies and overreach land on the nine desks of the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Many of the cases are a result of the massive federal government bureaucracy.
The growth in the number of White House Cabinet seats can be blamed for the federalization of public schools, the empowerment of the CDC, and frequent overreach by the EPA.
The Cabinet’s role is to advise the President on any subject he or she may require relating to the duties of each member’s respective office.
The 15 executive departments include the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Labor, State, Transportation, Treasury, and Veterans Affairs, and the Attorney General.
The attack on the coal industry during former President Obama’s eight years was aggressive with his Clean Power Plan almost becoming permanent law.
In February 2016, a week before Justice Antonin Scalia died, the court issued a 5-4 order that stopped President Obama’s Clean Power Plan from taking effect. It would have forced broad changes at power plants and required many to switch from using coal.
During the Trump Presidency, their bill was put on the shelf without any debate on changing the language to satisfy the court’s objection to it.
In anticipation of the Biden EPA also trying to force the coal industry out of business with massive Green New Deal regulations and very expensive upgrades, coal producers and the 20 states aligned with West Virginia went back to court seeking a ruling that would limit the EPA’s authority.
They recently lost at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
In bad timing for the White House, as President Biden heads to Glasgow, Scotland for a U.N global summit on climate change, the high court on Friday agreed to hear an appeal brought by the states and various industry groups, including coal interests.
The Supreme Court will review the lower courts ruling striking down a Trump-era rule intended to constrain regulation of carbon emissions from power plants.
This news has to take some wind out of Boden’s sail because, at the summit, countries are expected to announce their latest efforts to cut carbon emissions and shift away from coal toward cleaner sources of energy by the end of the decade.
The court’s intervention was unusual because the administration has yet to issue any such regulations. But the coalition of conservative states said the court should act now to prevent new regulations that could “force dramatic changes in how and where electricity is produced.”
Kassie Siegel, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute reacted to the court’s decision, “It’s deeply disturbing to see sufficient votes on the Supreme Court to launch this transparently political attack on Biden’s climate authority as the president heads to Glasgow.
Siegel continued, “The timing of this announcement is a hammer blow to the already fractured reputation of America’s highest court, whose radical right-wing now seems to care nothing about either legal precedent or our planet’s future.”
“This is a tremendous victory for West Virginia and our nation,” West Virginia Atty. Gen. Patrick Morrisey said Friday. “Given the insurmountable costs of President Biden’s proposals, our team is eager to present West Virginia’s case as to why the Supreme Court should define the reach of EPA’s authority once and for all.”
Morrisey said the court should not allow the EPA to have “new and wildly expansive authority” to transform major sectors of the economy.
Supreme Court signals it may block Biden's EPA from curbing power plants carbon pollution https://t.co/szALN60etg
— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) October 30, 2021
This upcoming decision by the Supreme Court could have a dramatic and lasting impact on the future of the energy industry as a whole.
Eric Thompson is a syndicated political writer and Christian podcaster.
