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Ag sector impacted by recent SCOTUS decision

The deputy legal counsel with the American Farm Bureau Federation says the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to no longer abide by the Chevron deference is starting to impact the ag sector.

The doctrine, used for 40 years, instructs courts to defer to a federal agency’s interpretation of unclear laws and at the end of June, SCOTUS decided to end the doctrine.

Travis Cushman tells Brownfield “any rule the agency puts out, it will have to be evaluated in the light of if the agency actually has the authority or they’re making it up.”

He says a South Dakota farmer was granted a petition this week for another hearing in the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals on a wetland case.

“Mr. Foster is challenging the NRCS regulation replies to wetland determinations and getting new determinations done. SCOTUS sent the case back down and basically told the Eighth Circuit hey, you have to re-evaluate this case, you actually have to look at the statute and see if Congress granted this agency the power it claims to have.”

Cushman says the recent SCOTUS decision is important anytime a federal agency’s rule is challenged, like the Waters of the United States.

“For years, this has gone back and forth from administration to administration. The EPA keeps looking for more authority and claiming they have it,” he says. “It would be helpful in our case against the current WOTUS rule, because we say can hey, judges, we can’t take the EPA’s word for it they have this authority.”

The EPA’s Endangered Species Act, its Clean Water Act, and the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Services’ wetland determinations are recent examples where the Chevron deference has given power to agencies to interpret laws that have impacted farmers.