The Nov. 5 election was not a good day for supporters of the current structure of environmental regulation. While I doubt that the burdens of environmental regulation figured prominently in the decision of many to vote for Republicans that day, one cannot doubt that at least some within the incoming national administration would like to burn the “administrative state” to the ground, including the environmental wing of that edifice.
That presents an opportunity for a thought experiment, no matter one’s politics; columns like this are full of those thought experiments this time of year. If the flames consume the federal regulatory structure that we have known all our careers in the environmental legal field, what would you want to rise from those ashes, assuming the political pendulum swings back at some point. If you were able to advise the incoming administration from the inside, which rooms in the regulatory mansion would you save from the blaze?
Click to read the full article, published by The Legal Intelligencer Dec. 17, 2024. Reprinted with permission.