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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowA U.S. appeals court has put on hold new federal environmental regulations governing American water bodies while it reviews a legal challenge from 18 states.
The ruling Friday by a divided three-judge panel in Cincinnati is the latest development in a series of skirmishes between President Barack Obama’s administration and states over the expansion of executive-branch regulatory powers.
Published in June, the water regulations – which apply to dry creek beds, prairie wetlands and other areas not previously subject to federal control – were immediately denounced as overreaching by the states and a raft of business and trade groups.
“A stay temporarily silences the whirlwind of confusion that springs from uncertainty about the requirements of the new rule and whether they will survive legal testing,” U.S. Circuit Judge David McKeague, who was appointed by Republican President George W. Bush, wrote for the two-judge majority.
The third judge on the tribunal, Damon Keith, who was appointed by Democratic President Jimmy Carter, called his colleagues’ decision premature because it was still unclear whether the court had jurisdiction over the dispute.
The case is In Re: Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Defense Final Rule, 15-3799, 15-3822, 15-3853 and 15-3887, U.S. Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit (Cincinnati).
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