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Environmental
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March 12, 2025
Calif. Asks Justices To Ax Fuel Groups' Clean Air Waiver Suit
California asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday to uphold the D.C. Circuit's ruling that biofuel and fossil fuel industry players don't have standing to challenge the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Air Act waiver allowing the Golden State to set standards limiting greenhouse gas emissions for vehicles.
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March 12, 2025
Cancer Cause Or Red Herring? Jury Weighs Plant Bellwether
A medical sterilization company told a Colorado jury Wednesday that four women can't get millions in damages based on the "possibility" that emissions from a sterilization plant caused their cancer, at the close of a six-week trial in which the plaintiffs argued the company should be punished for its negligence.
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March 12, 2025
EPA Puts 'Holy Grail Of Climate Change Religion' In Crosshairs
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday said it is reconsidering its 2009 finding that some greenhouse gases endanger humans' health and welfare — putting the fate of rules that sprang from that landmark conclusion into question.
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March 12, 2025
EPA Says Grant Termination Moots Climate Group's Challenge
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency told a D.C. federal judge Wednesday that its cancelation of $20 billion in grant funding for climate change projects renders moot Climate United Fund's claim that Citibank is illegally denying its disbursement requests.
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March 12, 2025
Insurance Pros Urge Calif. Lawmakers To Address Fire Risks
Insurance experts in a committee hearing that largely summed up concerns following the Los Angeles fires urged California lawmakers on Wednesday to address rising physical risks, smoke damage complaints, and regulations meant to expand coverage access.
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March 12, 2025
Alaska Tribal Groups' Bid To Update Fish Harvesting Rule Fails
A federal judge has said the National Marine Fisheries Service didn't violate the law by relying on 2004 and 2007 environmental impact statements to determine specifications for a final groundfish harvest rule for the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands, rejecting two Alaskan tribal organizations' bid to vacate the rule.
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March 12, 2025
Ga. City Faces $35M Suit Over Recycling Plant Flip-Flop
An Atlanta-based concrete recycling business has sued the city of Stonecrest, Georgia, its mayor and city council members in federal court Tuesday for $35 million, alleging political flip-flopping by officials is costing it and a landowner approximately $640,000 per month while its facility sits idle.
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March 12, 2025
HUD Rejects NC City's DEI-Incorporating Disaster Relief Plan
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said it rejected a draft plan submitted by Asheville, North Carolina, outlining how the city would distribute $225 million in federal relief funds for hurricane recovery due to the plan's incorporation of "DEI criteria."
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March 12, 2025
Justices Face Renewed Calls To Nix Mass. Wind Farm Permits
Fishing industry groups have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to undo federal approvals of the Vineyard Wind project off the Massachusetts coast, less than two months after the justices declined to consider another legal challenge by project opponents.
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March 12, 2025
Texas Urges Court Not To Let DuPont Out Of PFAS Lawsuit
Chemical companies DuPont and Corteva are leaning on a "fraudulent transfer scheme" in order to exit a lawsuit accusing them of making and selling forever chemicals despite knowing about their toxic nature, the state of Texas said Tuesday, urging a federal court not to give them the out.
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March 12, 2025
Second Bid For Roundup Mass Tort Launched In New Jersey
A second application for lawsuits against Monsanto Co. and Bayer AG alleging injuries by exposure to the company's weed killer Roundup to be designated as multicounty litigation has been filed with the New Jersey Supreme Court, according to a notice to the bar.
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March 12, 2025
Arizona Lawmakers Reintroduce $5B Tribal Water Rights Act
A bipartisan group of Arizona federal lawmakers reintroduced a bill to finalize a $5.1 billion water rights settlement for three Indigenous tribes in the Colorado River Basin that, if approved, will resolve one of the Grand Canyon State's longest-running water disputes.
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March 12, 2025
Duane Morris Adds Meyers Nave Enviro Litigation Duo In LA
Duane Morris LLP is expanding its environmental team, bringing in a pair of Meyers Nave environmental litigators at its Los Angeles office.
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March 11, 2025
6th Circ. Ends Group's Challenge To Great Lakes Fishing Pact
The Sixth Circuit on Tuesday rejected a nonprofit's challenge to a pact between Native American tribes and the state of Michigan for allegedly lacking guardrails to prevent overfishing in the Great Lakes, finding it lacked jurisdiction since the nonprofit never intervened in the case and only filed amicus curiae briefs.
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March 11, 2025
Art Loft Building's Toxicity Was Disclosed, Expert Testifies
A defense toxicologist told a Los Angeles jury Tuesday that residents in a large live-work art building received warning of carcinogenic chemicals in the soil underneath, supporting a real estate company's argument that the statute of limitations blocks the claims.
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March 11, 2025
Trump Admin Shutters EPA's Enviro Justice Office
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday dissolved its more than 30-year-old environmental justice and civil rights office, the latest in a string of EPA actions targeting efforts to ease pollution burdens on historically disadvantaged communities.
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March 11, 2025
Chemical, Carpet Cos. Seek Toss Of Ga. County's PFAS Suit
Nearly a dozen carpet and chemical manufacturers have moved to dismiss a Georgia county's lawsuit seeking to hold them responsible for an alleged public health crisis in the northwestern part of the state brought on by the sale and use of toxic chemicals in carpet manufacturing.
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March 11, 2025
NJ Residents Push To Repackage Contaminated Water Claims
Residents of National Park, New Jersey, asked a state appellate court panel for permission to revive and amend their proposed class claims over contaminated water, arguing Tuesday that the allegations are a matter for tort law, not contract law.
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March 11, 2025
Feds Push Back On Enviro Orgs., Tribes In Yellowstone Bison Case
The Interior Department is asking a federal court to reconsider orders that allowed environmental groups to intervene and add two more federal agencies as necessary parties to a challenge over the management of the bison population in Yellowstone National Park, arguing the move is an attempt to hijack the litigation.
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March 11, 2025
EPA Officially Cuts $20B In Funding For Climate Projects
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday canceled $20 billion in congressionally approved grant funding for climate change projects that it had frozen for weeks and criticized as wasteful and out of step with the Trump administration's priorities.
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March 11, 2025
6th Circ. Asks If It Should Duck Enbridge Pipeline Fight
A Sixth Circuit panel has asked if it should pause or reject altogether Enbridge Energy LP's lawsuit challenging Michigan's efforts to shutter a pipeline because of a pending state court case, requesting briefs ahead of oral arguments next week.
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March 11, 2025
Trump Taps DOJ Vet To Serve As Energy Dept.'s Top Lawyer
President Donald Trump has nominated a Winston & Strawn LLP partner, who formerly led the U.S. Department of Justice's Environment and Natural Resources Division during Trump's previous term, to serve as the U.S. Department of Energy's general counsel.
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March 11, 2025
Insurer Says AIG Unit Must Cover Water Contamination Suit
An AIG unit can't rely on its policy's pollution exclusion to bar coverage for a Texas water utility accused of providing contaminated water to residents, the utility's other insurer told a federal court, saying the court has already rejected the application of the exclusion in a related case.
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March 11, 2025
Groups Say EPA Must Regulate Phosphate Mining Waste
The Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club and others have called on the D.C. Circuit to order the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to regulate radioactive waste from phosphate mining and fertilizer production, which are currently excluded from federal regulation.
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March 11, 2025
Conservationists Sue FWS Over 'Blanket' Species Rule
Two conservation groups are suing the U.S. Department of the Interior in Montana federal court over an Endangered Species Act rule they say illegally gives the government power to indiscriminately restrict landowners' use of their property.
Expert Analysis
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BlackRock Suit Highlights Antitrust Risks Of ESG
In Texas v. BlackRock, pending in Texas federal court, 13 state attorneys general are suing large institutional investors in the coal business, underscoring key reasons companies may want to alter their approach to developing and implementing policies related to environmental, social, and governance factors, especially if coordination with competitors is involved, say attorneys at Manatt.
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Evidence Rule May Expand Use Of Out-Of-Court Statements
A proposed amendment to Federal Rule of Evidence 801(d)(1)(A) would broaden the definition of nonhearsay, reflects a more pragmatic approach to regulating the admissibility of out-of-court statements by declarant-witnesses, and could help level the playing field between prosecutors and criminal defendants, say attorneys at Hangley Aronchick.
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How Courts Can Filter Nonmeritorious Claims In Mass Torts
Nonmeritorious claims have been a key obstacle to settlement in many recent high-profile mass torts, but courts may be able to use tools they already have to solve this problem, says Samir Parikh at Wake Forest University.
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Series
Racing Corvettes Makes Me A Better Lawyer
The skills I use when racing Corvettes have enhanced my legal practice in several ways, because driving, like practicing law, requires precision, awareness and a good set of brakes — complete with the wisdom to know how and when to use them, says Kat Mateo at Olshan Frome.
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Opinion
Attorneys Must Act Now To Protect Judicial Independence
Given the Trump administration's recent moves threatening the independence of the judiciary, including efforts to impeach judges who ruled against executive actions, lawyers must protect the rule of law and resist attempts to dilute the judicial branch’s authority, says attorney Bhavleen Sabharwal.
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The Math Of Cross-Examination: Less Is More, More Is Less
When conducting cross-examination at trial, attorneys should remember that “less is more, and more is less” — limiting both the scope of questioning and the length of each query in order to control the witness’s testimony and keep the factfinders’ attention, says Thomas Innes at the Defender Association of Philadelphia.
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Rethinking 'No Comment' For Clients Facing Public Crises
“No comment” is no longer a cost-free or even a viable public communications strategy for companies in crisis, and counsel must tailor their guidance based on a variety of competing factors to help clients emerge successfully, says Robert Bowers at Moore & Van Allen.
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Fund Names Rule FAQs Leave Some Interpretative Uncertainty
Although recently released FAQs clarify many specific points of the 2023 expansion to the Investment Company Act's fund names rule, important questions remain about how U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission staff will interpret other key terms when the end-of-year compliance date arrives, say attorneys at Dechert.
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How Design Thinking Can Help Lawyers Find Purpose In Work
Lawyers everywhere are feeling overwhelmed amid mass government layoffs, increasing political instability and a justice system stretched to its limits — but a design-thinking framework can help attorneys navigate this uncertainty and find meaning in their work, say law professors at the University of Michigan.
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Tools For Witness Control That Go Beyond Leading Questions
Though leading questions can be efficient and effective for constraining a witness’s testimony, this strategy isn’t appropriate for every trial and pretrial scenario, so techniques like headlining and looping can be deployed during direct examination, depositions and even witness interviews, says Allison Rocker at Baker McKenzie.
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Opinion
US Steel-Nippon Merger Should Not Have Been Blocked
The Biden administration's block of the U.S. Steel and Nippon Steel merger on national security grounds was unconstitutional overreach and needs to be overturned, with the harms remedied in federal court, says attorney Chuck Meyer.
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10 Issues To Watch In Aerospace And Defense Contracting
This year, in addition to evergreen developments driven by national security priorities, disruptive new technologies and competition with rival powers, federal contractors will see significant disruptions driven by the new administration’s efforts to reduce government spending, regulation and the size of the federal workforce, say attorneys at Thompson Hine.
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Navigating The Trump Enviro Rollback And Its Consequences
The Trump administration's rapid push for environmental deregulation will lead to both opportunities and challenges, requiring companies to adopt strategic approaches to a complex, unpredictable legal environment in which federal rollbacks are countered by increased enforcement by states, and risks of citizen litigation may be heightened, say attorneys at Beveridge & Diamond.
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Series
Competitive Weightlifting Makes Me A Better Lawyer
The parallels between the core principles required for competitive weightlifting and practicing law have helped me to excel in both endeavors, with each holding important lessons about discipline, dedication, drive and failure, says Damien Bielli at VF Law.
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8 Ways Cos. Can Prep For Termination Of Their Enviro Grants
The federal government appears to be reviewing energy- and infrastructure-related grants and potentially terminating grants inconsistent with the Trump administration's stated policy goals, and attorneys at DLA Piper provide eight steps that recipients of grants should consider taking in the interim.