A district court granted California cities' motions to remand their climate change tort actions against oil and gas companies back to state court. Although their state law claims raise national and perhaps global questions, they should not have been removed to federal court. Removal based on federal...

In a 259-page opinion, a federal claims court held that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is responsible for causing recurrent flooding along the Missouri River. Farmers, landowners, and business owners filed takings claims against the government, arguing that the Corps' management of the Missouri Ri...

A district court held that public interest and environmental groups lacked standing to challenge the "two-for-one" executive order issued by President Trump on January 30, 2017. The order requires executive branch agencies to identify two existing regulations to be repealed for every new regulation,...

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the 2014 Gun Lake Trust Land Reaffirmation Act, which reaffirmed as trust land certain property on which a Native American tribe wished to build a casino and provided that any future or pending actions relating to that land should be dismissed. Congress enacted the Gun ...

A district court adopted a magistrate judge's recommendations and denied motions to dismiss a lawsuit brought by a group of young people against the U.S. government for failing to protect them from climate change. The plaintiffs alleged that the government has known for decades that carbon dioxide (...

The D.C. Circuit, in an unpublished opinion, upheld an Interior Board of Land Appeals (IBLA) decision invalidating an individual's mining claims on federal land in Oregon. DOI made those determinations so that the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, which was considering takings claims by the individual, ...

The Court of Federal Claims held that residents and businesses in New Orleans' Ninth Ward and the neighboring St. Bernard Parish may file class-action lawsuits against the government for flood damage caused by Hurricane Katrina. A year ago, the court ruled that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' cons...

A district court denied a manufacturing company's motion to certify for interlocutory appeal certain questions pertaining to its statute of limitations and claim preclusion defenses in an underlying case over who should bear the cost of cleaning up contamination at a steel processing site. The curre...

A district court granted Missouri's remand request to litigate in state court its lawsuit against the owner and operator of a landfill in connection with an uncontrolled, underground trash fire at the site. The state alleged various state law violations, along with claims for nuisance, cost recovery...

A district court held it lacks subject matter jurisdiction over a class action lawsuit that stems from the water contamination crisis in Flint, Michigan. The plaintiffs alleged that the city violated their constitutional rights and state law by providing contaminated water and requiring them to pay ...