WOTUS

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Department of the Army (the agencies) issued a final rule to amend the final “Revised Definition of ‘Waters of the United States’” rule.

A Congressional Review Act, or CRA, put forward by both Idaho senators Jim Risch and Mike Crapo, cleared the Senate Thursday, challenging the Biden administration’s Waters of the United States rule, which grossly expands federal regulatory authority over water.   “...

Last week, EPA Administrator Michael Regan defended his agency’s issuing its final WOTUS rule in December, ahead of what could be a watershed Supreme Court WOTUS ruling later this year.  Regan was pressed by Republican senators at an Environment and Public Works hearing on why EPA jumped ahead of the Supreme Court’s ruling expected by June in Sackett vs. EPA, a case many bel...

The Biden administration's version of the Waters of the U.S. rule went into effect Monday, but not for everyone.  Over the weekend, a Texas federal judge put the updated WOTUS on hold in Idaho as well as the Lone Star State.  The Court’s order Sunday granted a preliminary injunction halting the Biden WOTUS rules only for Idaho and Texas, who co-led a lawsuit.  The suits argued that E...

The U.S. House voted last week to repeal, on a largely symbolic 227-198 vote, the EPA’s controversial WOTUS rule.  The Senate could follow suit as soon as this week.  Democrats argued clean water is a human right that will suffer with the GOP’s move.  However nine Democrats, inclu...

Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen and attorneys general from 23 other states filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration’s Waters of the U.S. Rule.  The group says the EPA’s WOTUS rule “goes beyond the power Congress delegated in the Clean Water Act, raises serious constitutional concerns, and runs roughshod over the Administrative Procedures Act.”   “The administrati...

The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association is out with its policy priorities for 2023.  The priorities focus on advancing animal disease preparedness, protecting voluntary conservation programs, and defending producers from regulatory overreach.   “Our f...

On Thursday, Idaho Senators Jim Risch and Mike Crapo as well as West Virginia's Shelley Moore Capito, Ranking Member of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, joined 47 of their Senate Republican colleagues in introducing a formal challenge to the Biden administration’s WOTUS rule.  Tha...

Thursday, several members of the House of Representatives, including Washington’s Dan Newhouse, Illinois’ Mike Bost, North Carolina’s David Rouzer, and Iowa’s Mariannette Miller-Meeks led 192 other House Republicans in a letter blasting the Administration for its "premature and reckless WOTUS final rule".  The Members demand th...

An attorney for the American Farm Bureau Federation said a lawsuit filed by the Bureau and other farm groups against the EPA’s final ‘Waters of the U.S.’ rule is needed, on top of any favorable Supreme Court ruling.  Deputy General Counsel Travis Cushman says the latest WOTUS lawsuit is needed, not just because of a possible timing gap between the Biden EPA rule effective in March and a Supreme Co