The D.C. Circuit reversed summary judgment for Oregon counties, trade groups, and timber companies in five lawsuits concerning President Obama's expansion of the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument. Plaintiffs argued that by outlawing logging on land included in the monument through Proclamation 9564...

A district court granted EPA's and the Army Corps of Engineers' motion to stay Texas' and Idaho's challenge to the Biden Administration's 2023 rule revising the definition of "waters of the United States" under the CWA. The court stayed the suit until publication in the Federal Register of the agenc...

The Tenth Circuit affirmed denial of conservation groups' claims in a lawsuit concerning the Bureau of Reclamation's decision to sign a water contract allowing the state of Utah to draw from reservoir releases rather than the Green River and its tributaries. The groups argued the Bureau violated NEP...

The Sixth Circuit reversed a district court ruling in a lawsuit concerning 12 oil refinery sites that operated during World War II. The current owner of the refineries sought contribution from the U.S. government for environmental contamination discovered at the sites, arguing the government's produ...

The Ninth Circuit granted DOI's motion to dismiss a long-running land exchange dispute over construction of a road through the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge. The court found the Secretary of the Interior's recent withdrawal of the exchange, which was approved by a previous Secretary, mooted the c...

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 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...

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...