An Airtight Opinion on Fugitive Emissions
7/12/17 //
Commentary
A recent D.C. Circuit opinion vindicates the principle that while agencies may have discretion over how laws are enforced, they cannot use that enforcement discretion to cancel legal obligations altogether.
Versus Trump: "What About Congress? + Steven Wu"
6/8/17 //
Commentary
On a new episode of Versus Trump, Take Care's podcast, Easha, Jason, and Charlie discuss Congress's role and powers in investigations of the Executive. Then, Jason talks with Steven Wu, a Deputy Solicitor General in the Office of New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, about the case against Trump University, the active role of states in recent years, and other issues in which New York is adverse to the President. Listen now!
On Climate, Trump is a Mainstream Republican
6/2/17 //
Commentary
Debate over whether the world is better if we stay in or get out and the game-show-style interest that Trump (in typical Trumpian fashion) has generated regarding his BIG DECISION should not obscure two basic facts: (1) The Trump environmental policy is disastrous; and (2) when it comes to the environment and global warming especially, Trump is a mainstream Republican.
Versus Trump Podcast: G.G. Case + Patti Goldman
5/25/17 //
Commentary
On a new episode of Versus Trump, Take Care's podcast, we discuss the status of G.G. v. Gloucester County School Board, a major case about transgender rights, and then speak with Patti Goldman of Earthjustice about an important lawsuit that her organization has filed.
Let’s Not Burn The Paris Agreement To Save It
5/17/17 //
Commentary
Today on Take Care, Professor Ann Carlson offers a provocative idea. She suggests that we should be rooting—alongside EPA administrator Scott Pruitt—for the Trump Administration to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate accords. Here’s a less provocative take: No, we shouldn’t.
What Do We Really Gain if the U.S. Stays in the Paris Agreement?
5/17/17 //
Commentary
Trump already has eviscerated U.S. climate policy. Leaving the Paris Agreement would thus do little harm, while remaining would provide Trump with a fig leaf to obfuscate the damage he is doing. From an environmentalist point of view, the U.S. might be better off if Trump withdraws.
Can President Trump Rewrite the Past?
5/3/17 //
Quick Reactions
In an executive order last week, President Trump purported to rewrite the text of two of President Obama’s decisions that withdrew millions of acres of the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans from future oil and gas speculation. Today, a group of environmental organizations has argued in court that Trump can’t just pretend the past never happened.
Calculating Costs and Defining Our Future
4/25/17 //
Commentary
The March for Science reminded us that cutting funding to science today harms generations to come. Yet there is also another, subtler way the Trump Administration threatens to impose future costs on young people: the way in which it calculates costs themselves in cost-benefit analyses essential to our administrative state.