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Balanced Reporting. Trusted Insights.
Wednesday, April 02, 2025
The Trump administration is making its first foray into the longstanding controversy over the meaning of “waters of the U.S.” in the Clean Water Act, issuing guidance Wednesday to align its policy with the Supreme Court’s Sackett decision.
Federal agencies are leaving landowners in the dark about what they can legally do under the Clean Water Act without violating the law, representatives of agriculture and other industries told lawmakers Wednesday.
Legal experts gave senators conflicting views Wednesday on whether the Supreme Court’s Sackett decision is consistent with the science around the connectivity of waters.
Farm groups are among the dozens of industry trade associations expressing concern that the Environmental Protection Agency will try to retain broad authority to regulate discharges into non-navigable waters despite the Supreme Court’s ruling in Sackett.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s budget would be slashed to its lowest level since 1991 in a spending bill approved by the Republican-controlled House Appropriations Committee Wednesday.
The Biden administration plans to incorporate a recent Supreme Court decision into its existing Waters of the U.S. rulemaking rather than withdraw the rule in its entirety.
The Supreme Court’s Clean Water Act decision to limit the federal government’s jurisdiction over “adjacent” wetlands prompted warnings that millions of acres of wetlands could be at risk, but also generated cheers from farm groups that have fought the interpretation of the 50-year-old law for decades.
