ATLANTA – A federal district court judge in North Dakota has temporarily blocked the operation of a new federal rule in 24 states about what water bodies the federal government can regulate.
The ruling comes in response to a lawsuit filed by the attorneys general of 24 states about the definition of the term “waters of the United States,” or WOTUS, under the federal Clean Water Act. Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr helped lead the lawsuit.
The definition of WOTUS is important because it determines to which waterways federal environmental protections apply.
The federal Environmental Protection Agency finalized the new definition last month. It includes many tributaries and streams as well as “adjacent wetlands,” or wetlands close to other waters regulated by the Clean Water Act.
In the case of Georgia, tributaries would include the Tallulah River, Sweetwater Creek, and Peachtree Creek. Adjacent wetlands would include portions of the Chickasawhatchee Swamp in Southwest Georgia and Peters Bay near Lakeland in South Georgia.
That definition has been challenged by the attorneys general of 24 states who contend these water bodies should fall solely under the purview of state regulation. They want the new WOTUS definition declared invalid.
This week, District Judge Daniel Hovland agreed with the states’ request for a preliminary injunction, temporarily preventing the federal government from applying the new definition while litigation is underway.
“The twenty-four States in this case have persuasively shown that the new 2023 Rule poses a threat to their sovereign rights and amounts to irreparable harm,” Hovland wrote.
“The States involved in this litigation will expend unrecoverable resources complying with a rule unlikely to withstand judicial scrutiny,” added Hovland, who was nominated for his federal…
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