Farm groups and agricultural stakeholders are celebrating a federal appeals panel decision to issue a nationwide stay on the Environmental Protection Agency's Waters of the U.S. (WOTUS) rule, suspending the rule's implementation in the 37 states that were outside of an earlier ruling.

 

In the opinion, Judge David McKeague of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, said the plaintiffs, 18 states in this case, “have demonstrated a substantial possibility of success on the merits of their claims” and that a stay will not cause undue harm to either the states or the environment.  Judge Richard Griffin joined in McKeague's opinion, providing the two-to-one majority.

 

“There is no compelling showing that any of the petitioners will suffer immediate irreparable harm - in the form of interference with state sovereignty, or in unrecoverable expenditure of resources as they endeavor to comply with the new regime - if a stay is not issued pending determination of this court's jurisdiction,” McKeague wrote. “But neither is there any indication that the integrity of the nation's waters will suffer imminent injury if the new scheme is not immediately implemented and enforced.”

 

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