The U.S. Supreme Court held, 5-4, that an 1868 peace treaty between the Navajo Nation and the United States establishing the Navajo Reservation reserved necessary water to accomplish the purpose of the reservation, but did not require the U.S. government to take affirmative steps to secure water for...

The Ninth Circuit, 2-1, denied a municipal irrigation district's request to compel a district court to remand to state court its motion for preliminary injunction in a suit concerning water allocation in the Klamath Basin. The district initially sought to stop the Bureau of Reclamation from releasin...

A district court granted in part and denied in part an environmental group's motion for summary judgment in a CWA citizen suit concerning the Forest Service's discharge of aerially deployed fire retardant into navigable waters of the United States without an NPDES permit. The group argued the Servic...

The Tenth Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part dismissal of a challenge to the Forest Service's approval of grazing permits in Bridger-Teton National Forest that authorized the "lethal take" of grizzly bears. Environmental groups challenged the approval, arguing FWS violated the ESA because...

The U.S. Supreme Court held that the CWA extends to only those "wetlands with a continuous surface connection to bodies that are 'waters of the United States' in their own right," such that they are indistinguishable from those waters, in a challenge to an EPA compliance order stating that landowner...

A district court denied summary judgment for a group of landowners in a challenge to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management's (BOEM's) and NMFS' decisions approving an offshore wind energy project off the coast of Nantucket. The group argued that NMFS violated the ESA by failing to adequately conside...

The Ninth Circuit affirmed vacatur of FWS' designation of an area in the northern Santa Rita Mountains as occupied critical habitat for jaguar. An environmental group initially sued FWS, challenging the Service's conclusion that a proposed copper mine project in the area would not destroy or adverse...

The Sixth Circuit granted the Commonwealth of Kentucky's and business groups' motions to preliminarily enjoin EPA's and the Army Corps of Engineers' 2023 rule revising the definition of "waters of the United States" under the CWA. A district court had denied the motions, concluding plaintiffs lacked...

The D.C. Circuit vacated EPA's withdrawal of its determination to regulate perchlorate in drinking water. An environmental group argued EPA lacked the authority to withdraw the determination under the SDWA, and that even if it did have such authority, it acted arbitrarily and capriciously in doing s...

A district court adopted the recommendations of a magistrate judge and vacated portions of NMFS' 2019 biological opinion concerning the incidental take statement that authorized take of southern resident killer whales and chinook salmon resulting from commercial harvest of chinook salmon during trol...