This past spring, in Ohio v. EPA, a 5-4 Supreme Court stayed the implementation of an Environmental Protection Agency rule governing interstate air pollution pending legal proceedings challenging the rule on the merits. This decision was unusual, but not without precedent. Back in 2016 the Supreme Court had also stayed the Obama Administration's Clean Power Plan–also by a 5-4 vote.
The Court's apparent willingness to press pause on major air pollution regulations, combined with an overall increase to consider aggressive "shadow docket" filings, encouraged industrial groups and conservative states to file multiple applications for stays of other EPA rules. After all, if the Court did it twice, it could do it again. None of these recent applications have been successful however.
At the Court's long conference, the justices denied multiple applications seeking stays of EPA rules governing hazardous air pollutants and methane emissions. Then, yesterday (in a more closely watched case), the Court rejected applications seeking a stay of the Biden Adminsitration's rules limiting greenhouse gas emissions from power plants (basically the Biden Administration's replacement for the CPP). Only Justice Thomas dissented. (Justice Alito did not participate.) [See also Sam Bray's post on the application denial.]
