Response to motion to dismiss virginia full#

Motion for preliminary injunction denied.įederal Court in Virginia Declined to Issue Preliminary Injunction in Challenge to CEQ Amendments to NEPA Regulations. Response filed by defendants' to plaintiffs' motion for a status conference. Motion for status conference filed by plaintiffs. The court also clarified that discovery was not contemplated but that summary judgment motions might be supported by expert declarations or other interpretive opinion. The court denied the defendants' and defendant-intervenors' motion to dismiss the lawsuit. Plaintiffs' motion for status conference denied, defendants' and defendant-intervenors' motions to dismiss denied, and defendants' proposed schedule adopted.Ĭourt Denied Motions to Dismiss Challenge to Amended NEPA Regulations. The court noted that briefing on summary judgment motions was nearly complete and found that adding delay to the court’s decision on the pending motions would not be appropriate. The federal district court for the Western District of Virginia denied the defendants’ request for a 60-day stay to allow the Biden-Harris administration time to review challenged amendments to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations.

Reply filed by business associations in support of their cross-motion for summary judgment.ĭefendants' motion for stay of case denied. Motion for remand without vacatur filed by defendants. Opposition filed by plaintiffs to federal defendants' motion for remand without vacatur.

With respect to standing, the court found that the environmental groups’ alleged environmental, procedural, and information injuries were too speculative to satisfy the constitutional injury-in-fact requirement.Ĭase dismissed without prejudice and motions for summary judgment and defendants' motion for remand without vacatur terminated as moot.

Response to motion to dismiss virginia full#

With respect to ripeness, the court found that “he potential applications and outcomes of the regulatory changes adopted are simply too attenuated and speculative to allow for a full understanding and consideration of how they may impact the plaintiffs.” The court noted that each federal agency would have to adopt its own NEPA procedures before CEQ’s regulatory amendments could be applied to any particular federal action, and further noted that following the change in administrations, CEQ was “actively reconsidering” the 2020 amendments and had directed agencies not to use resources to develop their own procedures. The court concluded that the groups’ claims were not justiciable both because the claims were not ripe and because the groups did not have standing. The federal district court for the Western District of Virginia dismissed without prejudice a lawsuit brought by environmental groups to challenge the Council on Environmental Quality’s (CEQ’s) 2020 amendments to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations. Virginia Federal Court Said Challenge to NEPA Regulations Was Not Justiciable. The district court held that the plaintiffs did not have standing and that their claims were not ripe. Environmental groups filed a notice of appeal of the order of the federal district court for the Western District of Virginia dismissing their lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s amendment of the Council on Environmental Quality’s regulations implementing NEPA. Council on Environmental QualityĮnvironmental Groups Appealed Dismissal of NEPA Regulations Lawsuit. Opening brief filed by plaintiffs-appellants. The Fourth Circuit further concluded that the plaintiffs lacked standing to assert claims related to the 2020 rule’s requirements for public comments and that the plaintiffs’ remaining claims were not ripe.Īnswering brief filed by intervenors-appellees American Farm Bureau Federation et al.Īnswering brief filed by defendants-appellees. The Fourth Circuit found that challenges regarding direct, indirect, and cumulative effects, and reasonable alternatives to the extent they were required to prioritize applicants’ goals were moot due to CEQ’s adoption in 2022 of a rule that returned the regulatory language related to these issues to essentially what was in place prior to the 2020 rule. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal of environmental groups’ lawsuit challenging the 2020 amendments to the Council on Environmental Quality’s (CEQ’s) National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations. Fourth Circuit Affirmed Dismissal of Environmental Groups’ Challenge to Trump Administration NEPA Regulations.