How Does a Recent Supreme Court Ruling Apply to EPA’s Implementation of TSCA?

Since the U.S. Supreme Court issued its blockbuster ruling in West Virginia v. EPA, 597 US _ 2022 WL 2347278 (June 30, 2022), many are asking whether the Court’s amplification of the “major questions doctrine” (MQD) might be used to seek to limit the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) authority in implementing Congress’s 2016 amendments to the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act (Lautenberg Act).

The answer is yes. West Virginia will henceforth be cited with predictable regularity in claiming that EPA, or any federal agency for that matter, has taken final agency action in what detractors will claim is an “extraordinary case” with outsized “economic and political significance” that, as Chief Justice John Roberts somewhat glibly noted, “raise[s] an eyebrow.” The full text of this article, written by Lynn L. Bergeson, Managing Partner, Bergeson & Campbell, P.C. (B&C^®) for Chemical Watch, is available here.