August, 01 2016, 02:45pm EDT
Anti-Clean Air Attorneys General Look to Block Methane Safeguards
Lawsuit Seeks to Allow Oil and Gas Operations and Infrastructure to Emit Methane Pollution
WASHINGTON
Last week, Texas and North Dakota filed lawsuits to block the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) recently finalized methane standards for the oil and gas sector. These common-sense safeguards would protect communities from the dangers of methane pollution emitted from new and modified oil and gas operations and infrastructure.
The standards, finalized on May 12th, are the first-ever to protect against methane pollution, a greenhouse gas 87-times more potent than carbon dioxide in the near term. Earlier this year, EPA released its annual Greenhouse Gas Inventory report, which confirmed not only that the oil and gas industry is the leading emitter of methane pollution in the United State, but that sector-wide methane emissions are considerably higher than EPA previously estimated.
In response, Sierra Club Director of Beyond Dirty Fuels campaign Lena Moffitt released the following statement:
"The methane safeguards reflect EPA's duty to protect our communities from dangerous pollution and are consistent with decades of action taken by the agency. Any lawsuit attempting to block them is an attack on clean air and a stable climate.
"Communities around the country continue to suffer from pollution from the oil and gas industry, yet the attorneys general of Texas and North Dakota aim to block these common-sense standards rather than protect their own citizens -- ignoring both the well-being of their own residents, as well as the strong desire of Americans across the country to see these safeguards kept in place.
"The Sierra Club is confident that these standards will be upheld in the courts."
The Sierra Club is the most enduring and influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. We amplify the power of our 3.8 million members and supporters to defend everyone's right to a healthy world.
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Conservative Texas District Court Won't Implement Anti-Judge Shopping Policy
The chief judge of the Northern District of Texas indicated the court will not follow new guidance, while a lower court judge called out a pro-business group's use of "judge shopping."
Mar 31, 2024
Right-wing groups will still be able to pick and choose the judges who hear their cases in one of the most conservative federal court districts in the United States, following a decision by the Northern District of Texas on Friday that goes against new anti-"judge shopping" guidance.
Chief U.S. District Judge David Godbey of the Northern District wrote in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer that the court would not abide by new guidance from the Judicial Conference, which said earlier this month that the court system should randomly assign lawsuits to any judge throughout the district where they're filed.
"The consensus was not to make any change to our case assignment process at this time," wrote Godbey, an appointee of former President George W. Bush.
The policy, announced on March 12, would require lawsuits that challenge federal or state laws to be assigned to a judge randomly throughout a federal district rather than staying in the specific smaller division where they were initially filed, a practice known as "judge shopping" or "venue shopping."
The practice has garnered scrutiny in recent months as right-wing groups have filed numerous lawsuits in the court of Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, who presides over a federal court in Amarillo, Texas—also in the state's Northern District.
Kacsmaryk, an appointee of former President Donald Trump, ruled last year that the Food and Drug Administration's approval of mifepristone, a drug used for medication abortion, should be suspended. The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in an appeal last week, and the justices signaled that they were unlikely to impose new restrictions on the medication.
After Republican lawmakers wrote to federal judges telling them to disregard the Judicial Conference's guidance—which the body noted is discretionary—Schumer called on the courts to apply the new reforms to stop "extremists" from handpicking judges.
Godbey's letter signaled that the court will continue allowing conservative plaintiffs to select the venue where their cases are heard.
Judiciary observers noted that another judge in the Northern District—Mark Pittman in the Fort Worth division—suggested that chief judges may not have the final word on whether judge shopping continues to be tolerated.
Pittman, who was also appointed by Trump, ruled that a case filed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other banking industry groups against the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) should be transferred to a federal court in Washington, D.C.
The judge agreed with the CFPB, which had argued the banking lobby had filed its lawsuit over the bureau's slashing of credit card late fees in the Northern District of Texas in order to secure a favorable ruling.
"Venue is not a continental breakfast; you cannot pick and choose on a plaintiff's whim where and how a lawsuit is filed," said Pittman. "Federal courts have consistently cautioned against such behavior."
"Even the judges you least expect," said David Dayen of The American Prospect, "are pissed at being pawns in a conservative game."
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Right-Wing Court's PFAS Ruling Will Impede Regulation of Harmful Chemicals, Advocates Say
Public health groups are "fully committed to taking all steps available to assure that the Inhance fluorination no longer produces dangerous PFAS which put workers, consumers, and communities at risk."
Mar 31, 2024
As public health experts raise alarm over the prevalence of highly toxic "forever chemicals," as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances or PFAS are commonly known, one nonprofit investigative journalism outlet warned Saturday that a recent ruling could further tie up the regulatory process for the chemicals and other harmful substances.
"This ruling is likely to impede already excruciatingly slow efforts to regulate the presence of health harming chemicals in products people use in every part of their lives," said Watershed Investigations of a decision handed down earlier this month by the right-wing Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans.
The case is one of several involving Inhance Technologies, a Houston-based company that manufactures an estimated 200 million plastic containers each year using the fluorination process, which creates perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), a toxic PFAS compound.
In 2020, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) began requiring companies to submit notices regarding "significant new uses" of PFAS under Section 5 of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), as officials identified the chemicals as an "urgent public health and environmental issue" due to their links to cancer, liver and kidney disease, reproductive harms, and other serious health problems.
The agency found that PFAS were leaching into pesticides held in containers produced by Inhance.
In December, the agency prohibited Inhance from using the fluorination process because it had identified PFAS as an "unavoidable aspect" of its operations. Inhance sued the EPA soon after.
Inhance said that ending its fluorination practices would ultimately force the company to shut down and fought the EPA's order, arguing that it had created its plastic containers in the same way for decades, and therefore was not subject to the TSCA provision regarding "significant new use."
The EPA argued it only became aware of Inhance's process in 2020, but the conservative court disagreed that it could regulate the company under the "new use" rule—even as the judges acknowledged the company's products are harmful.
"The court did not dispute EPA's underlying decision that this is a danger to human health, what they did was say it's not a new use, which I think is wrong... but this case isn't over by any stretch," Kyla Bennett, a former EPA official who is now director of science policy for Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), told The Guardian Saturday.
The judges said the EPA would have to regulate Inhance's containers under Section 6 of the TSCA, which it said requires the EPA to take into account the economic impact any regulations would have on Inhance.
PEER noted that Section 6 also states that health risks should be considered.
"The court erroneously limits EPA's authority to issue significant new use rules (SNURs) under the TSCA, seriously weakening this important tool for managing chemical risks to health and the environment which has been a mainstay of the TSCA program since the law's enactment in 1976," the group said.
Another case is playing out in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, where the EPA sued Inhance in 2022 for violating the TSCA. The Center for Environmental Health and PEER also took legal action against Inhance for the same reason, and against the EPA last month for withholding test data regarding PFAS in plastic containers.
"There are several paths forward," said PEER, "and our groups are fully committed to taking all steps available to assure that the Inhance fluorination no longer produces dangerous PFAS which put workers, consumers, and communities at risk."
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'Every Year It Is More Relevant': Palestinians Mark Land Day Amid Genocide
"We honor those who rose up in 1976 and all who have risen up to fight for justice in Palestine," said one advocacy group.
Mar 30, 2024
This is a developing story... Please check back for possible updates...
Palestinians on Saturday were joined by people across the globe in marking Land Day, the 48th anniversary of Israel's killing of six unarmed protesters who rose up against the Israeli government's confiscation and occupation of Palestinian land.
Thousands of Palestinian people marched through Deir Hanna, one of the Israeli towns where authorities violently cracked down on nonviolent protesters on March 30, 1976, as they honored Raja Abu Raya, Khader Khalayleh, Khadija Shawahneh, Kheir Yassin, Mohsin Taha, and Raafat Zuhairi.
More than 100 people were also injured by Israeli authorities during the protest in 1976, which was organized in opposition to Israel's confiscation of nearly 5,000 acres of land that belonged to Palestinian citizens of Israel in the northern Galilee region.
The Good Shepherd Collective, an anti-Zionist human rights group based in the West Bank, said that with Israel bombarding Gaza and conducting raids almost daily in the West Bank as officials seize more land, Land Day becomes "more relevant" every year.
"No Palestinian needs to be reminded of the centrality of the land in the struggle for justice and liberation. Land Day is more a remembrance of one massacre among hundreds over more than one hundred years of Zionist violence," said Good Shepherd Collective. "In the midst of a genocide, we must continue to speak out and speak of the context of settler-colonialism's baked-in logic of elimination."
Last week, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrichannounced Israel was seizing nearly 2,000 acres of land in the occupied West Bank, which would allow the country to build more illegal settlements. The country's settlement-planning authority said earlier this month it had approved the construction of 3,500 new housing units in the territory.
As the Middle East Eyereported, Israeli forces conducted overnight raids across the West Bank ahead of Land Day, killing a 13-year-old boy named Nabil Abu Abed near Jenin.
The U.S.-based Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) marked Land Day as organizers with the group held solidarity marches and rallies in cities including Boston; Portland, Maine; and Providence, Rhode Island. Other groups organized a march scheduled for Saturday evening in New York City.
The group noted that Land Day also marks the beginning of the Great March of Return protests, which were held weekly for 21 months starting on March 30, 2018 as demonstrators demanded an end to Israel's blockade of Gaza and the right to return to the homes their families were expelled from in 1948 when Zionist forces cleared the way to establish Israel. More than 200 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces for participating in the marches, including 46 children.
"We mourn the thousands whom the Israeli military murdered or permanently injured over the years. We honor those who rose up in 1976 and all who have risen up to fight for justice in Palestine," said JVP.
Marches also took place in Cardiff, Wales; London; Madrid; and Helsingborg, Sweden, with protesters reiterating the demand for an immediate, permanent cease-fire in Gaza.
"I'll keep [marching] as long as the bombing and the apartheid and the injustice is going on," Stephen Kapos, an 86-year-old survivor of the Holocaust, told Al Jazeera.
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