This story was originally published by Slate and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
Say what you want about this administration’s competence, but there’s one area where they are succeeding for now: Scott Pruitt has been the Environmental Protection Agency’s administrator for a short five months, and already he has speedily and forcefully upended an unprecedented number of environmental rules, earning a reputation as one of the few Cabinet members to effectively move Trump’s deregulatory agenda forward. Pruitt claims that these regulatory rollbacks represent a return to the “rule of law,” but he has pursued them in a lawless fashion, cutting corners and ignoring fundamental legal requirements. Now, failing to follow the rules of the game is catching up with him — his EPA recently suffered its first courtroom defeat, kicking off what is likely to be a long losing streak and creating regulatory uncertainty along the way.
On July 3, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit — the court that will hear many of the challenges to the EPA’s onslaught of rollbacks — nixed Pruitt’s attempt to delay a rule limiting methane leaks ... Read more
