A district court ruled unconstitutional an Iowa statute that criminalized undercover investigations of slaughterhouses and other animal facilities. Environmental groups argued that the state statute impermissibly restricted their free speech under the First Amendment because it was a content- and vi...

A district court granted an environmental group's motion for partial summary judgment against EPA for failure to respond to the group's FOIA requests. The group argued that the Agency violated FOIA by not making a determination whether to comply with the group's four FOIA requests within 20 business...

A state court dismissed a lawsuit filed by a mining company challenging the Montana Department of Environmental Quality's labeling of the company's chief executive officer as a "bad actor" under state mining law, effectively prohibiting the company from conducting mining and exploration activities i...

The Arizona Supreme Court vacated a ruling that a Native American tribe sufficiently alleged standing to bring a public nuisance claim against a resort using reclaimed wastewater to make artificial snow on the San Francisco Peaks in northern Arizona. Before the lower court, the tribe argued that the...

A district court temporarily stayed proceedings in which a pipeline developer sought access to a North Carolina farm for construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. The landowner sought to stay the pipeline developer's attempt to acquire eminent domain rights to his property to allow pending challe...

A district court vacated nationwide the Applicability Date Rule, which suspended the effect of the Clean Water Rule until February 2020 and required agencies in the interim to apply the pre-Clean Water Rule definition of "waters of the United States." Environmental groups argued that EPA and the U.S...

A district court declared unconstitutional a California law that regulates the recording of conveyances of federal public lands in the state. DOJ argued that the state law, which grants the State Lands Commission the right of first refusal on transfers of federal public lands, runs afoul of the doct...

A district court ruled unconstitutional two Wyoming statutes that impose criminal and civil penalties for data collection on private land or public land accessed via private land. Environmental groups argued that the statutes violated the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment. The court found th...

A district court vacated DOI's cancellation of an oil company's oil and gas lease in Montana. The company argued that cancellation after more than 30 years for a pre-lease NEPA violation that was never disclosed to the company was arbitrary and capricious. The court agreed, concluding that the agenc...

A district court denied an environmental group's motion for summary judgment challenging DOJ's withholding of legal memos concerning the president's authority to shrink national monuments under the Antiquities Act. The group argued that DOJ had no reasonable justification for withholding the memos a...