The clock had just struck 1:15 p.m. on Wednesday when the justices, who had been in the courtroom since 10 a.m., finally appeared at a loss of what else to ask U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar about “Chevron deference.”
After more than three hours of rapid-fire questioning, over the course of two separate hearings, it seemed like all that could be said had been said about whether to overturn the “foundational” doctrine of administrative law, as Prelogar had called it.
The silence, however, didn’t last long. Prelogar briefly scanned the faces of the justices for follow-up questions before launching back into her defense of Chevron, sparking another round of debate in the cavernous room. It would be nearly 2 p.m. by the time the justices shuffled down from the bench for their regular post-argument lunch together.
The length of Wednesday’s arguments at the court were a testament to the weightiness of the legal question before it: When the law is unclear, should courts defer to federal agencies’ reasonable interpretations? That relatively simple proposition, established in the Supreme Court’s 1984 decision in Chevron USA Inc. v. NRDC, has been cited in thousands of legal decisions over the last four decades and served as the bedrock of modern administrative law. The justices are now considering overruling Chevron entirely.
Welcome to Supreme Court Brief. Below, I break down five notable moments during Wednesday’s hearings on the fate of Chevron deference in the cases Relentless Inc. v. Department of Commerce and Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo.
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