More than 20 states sue Trump administration over changes to environmental law News
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More than 20 states sue Trump administration over changes to environmental law

More than 20 states filed a lawsuit Friday against the US Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) over changes to a key environmental law.

The lawsuit seeks to vacate a final rule, promulgated in July, which made various changes to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Since 1970, NEPA has served as the US’s “bedrock law for environmental protection by directing federal agencies to make well-informed decisions that protect public health and the environment,” according to the complaint

According to the CEQ and the Trump administration, the rule modernizes NEPA regulations to “streamline the development of infrastructure projects and promote better decision making by the Federal government.”

However, the plaintiffs allege that the rule derails NEPA by limiting which federal actions require compliance with NEPA, limiting federal agencies’ obligations to consider environmental impacts, rendering NEPA’s public participating process useless and unlawfully restricting “judicial review of agency actions that violate NEPA.”

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