In spite of the accelerating pace of global warming, the conservative majority of the Supreme Court dealt a major blow to the Biden administration's attempts to slash emissions through regulatory powers resting in federal agencies. In a 6-3 ruling, the Supreme Court on Thursday struck down the federal government's authority to regulate in areas like climate policy or food and worker safety.
The case, first heard by the Supreme Court back in February, was a lawsuit filed last year by West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, who argued that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) does not have the power to regulate the state's power plant emissions. At the center of the court's debate was how much regulatory authority is enshrined in the Clean Air Act, a 1963 air quality law designed to reduce pollution. That act, Morrissey and 19 other attorneys general argued, does not grant the EPA the ability to put caps on power plant emissions – a matter which they've otherwise said should be settled by the legislature.
