SC’s Overturning of Chevron Deference Is Judicial Overreach: BBC News

The US Supreme Court (SC), in a 6-3 vote, killed a precedent that conservatives have attacked for decades, known as the "Chevron deference," Anthony Zurcher, Nada Tawfik, Lisa Lambert, and Kayla Epstein reported for BBC News.

Throwing out the Chevron deference would be destabilizing. I Photo: Roo Reynolds Flickr

"Today, the court places a tombstone on Chevron no one can miss," Justice Neil Gorsuch, one of the most conservative members, wrote.

The deference, set in 1984 in a case involving the oil giant, gave federal agencies wide powers to interpret laws and decide the best ways to apply them.

In ending the deference, the conservative-majority court has slashed and weakened the powers of agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and fiddled with the mandate of agencies.

This is a defeat for the Biden administration, which argued that throwing out the Chevron deference would be destabilizing. Justice Elena Kagan said that the ruling elevates the SC’s power over other branches of the US government.

The president, Congress, and court are supposed to have equal power under the US Constitution, so by her reading, the ruling is a loss for the White House, the House of Representatives, and the Senate.

While “Chevron deference” may sound like a chess strategy, it actually refers to a landmark SC ruling, Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council. The court decided in 1984 that judges should defer to federal agencies in interpreting ambiguous parts of statutes.

The idea was that if Congress passes a law where something is unclear - or there is a “gap” - it is up to an agency to fill in the gap.

In practice, that gave arms of the federal government, such as the EPA, the freedom to create and implement rules without fear of protracted legal battles.

Then, in 2020, herring fishermen sued the Trump administration for requiring that they cover the costs of taking federal monitors on fishing trips.

It was illegal to fish without federal monitors on board to check on the Atlantic fishery, an area that extends from Maine to North Carolina. Commercial fishing companies - supported by conservative and corporate groups, including the billionaire Charles Koch - sued in two separate cases.