Amicus Curiae Brief — Diamond Alternative Energy, LLC, et al., Petitioners v. Environmental Protection Agency, et al.

Supreme Court briefFeb 3, 2025

Ask Donna

What actually matters in this document.

Text

No. 24-7

In the

Supreme Court of the United States

♦

DIAMOND ALTERNATIVE ENERGY, LLC, ET AL.,

Petitioners,

v.

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY, ET AL.,

Respondents

♦

On Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of

Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit

♦

BRIEF OF AMICI CURIAE TEXAS ROYALTY

COUNCIL, AMERICAN ROYALTY COUNCIL,

AND NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF

WHOLESALER-DISTRIBUTORS IN SUPPORT

OF PETITIONERS

♦

February 3, 2025

Ivan L. London

Counsel of Record

MOUNTAIN STATES

LEGAL FOUNDATION

2596 South Lewis Way

Lakewood, Colorado 80227

(303) 292-2021

ilondon@mslegal.org

Attorney for Amici Curiae

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

TABLE OF CONTENTS .....................................

i

TABLE OF AUTHORITIES ...............................

iii

IDENTITIES AND INTERESTS OF

AMICI CURIAE ..................................................

1

SUMMARY OF THE ARGUMENT....................

2

ARGUMENT .......................................................

4

THE LOWER COURT WENT

AGAINST THIS COURT’S

PRECEDENTS. ........................................

4

THE LOWER COURT’S

APPROACH TO ECONOMIC

HARM IGNORES REALITY. ..................

7

THE LOWER COURT’S

APPROACH REFLECTS A

PROCEDURAL DISCONNECT

THAT BLOCKS PARTIES

HARMED BY A REGULATION

FROM CHALLENGING IT. ....................

11

LOWER COURTS MUST

PROVIDE A CHECK ON

REGULATORY OVERREACH. ..............

14

I.

II.

III.

IV.

i

V.

COURTS SHOULD NOT LET

REGULATORS RUN

ROUGHSHOD OVER

AMERICAN MARKETS. .........................

15

CONCLUSION ....................................................

18

ii

TABLE OF AUTHORITIES

Cases

Page(s)

Amfac Resorts, L.L.C. v. U.S. Dep’t of the

Interior,

143 F. Supp. 2d 7 (D.D.C. 2001) ......................

12

Ashcroft v. Iqbal,

556 U.S. 662, (2009) .........................................

11

Associated Gen. Contractors of Cal., Inc. v.

Cal. State Council of Carpenters,

459 U.S. 519 (1983) ..........................................

10

City of Arlington v. FCC,

569 U.S. 290 (2013) ..........................................

14

Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw

Environmental Services,

528 U.S. 167 (2000) ..........................................

5

Harrison v. PPG Indus., Inc.,

446 U.S. 578 (1980) ..........................................

12

Kelly Oil Co. v. Svetlik,

975 S.W.2d 762 (Tex. App. Corpus Christi

1998) .................................................................

1

Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife,

504 U.S. 555 (1992) .................... 2, 4, 6, 9, 11, 12, 14

iii

Massachusetts v. EPA,

549 U.S. 497 (2007) ..........................................

4

Sierra Club v. EPA,

292 F.3d 895 (D.C. Cir. 2002) .......................... 13, 14

Simon v. E. Ky. Welfare Rights Org.,

426 U.S. 26 (1976) ............................................

4

Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer,

343 U.S. 579 (1952) ..........................................

14

Zenith Radio Corp. v. Hazeltine Research, Inc.,

395 U.S. 100 (1969) ..........................................

7

Constitutional Provisions and Statutes

U.S. Const. art. III, § 2, cl. 1 ...............................

42 U.S.C. § 7607(b)(1) ..................................

11

12, 14

Rules

Fed. R. App. P. 15................................................

11

Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a) ..............................................

11

iv

IDENTITIES AND INTERESTS OF

AMICI CURIAE 1

The Texas Royalty Council (TRC) and

American Royalty Council (ARC) are organizations

representing mineral interest owners across Texas

and the United States, respectively. TRC and ARC are

dedicated to advancing domestic oil and gas

production while protecting the property rights and

economic interests of royalty owners. In Texas, for

example, “a royalty interest in an oil and gas lease is

an interest in real property, held to have the same

attributes as real property.” Kelly Oil Co. v. Svetlik,

975 S.W.2d 762, 764 (Tex. App. Corpus Christi 1998).

Thus, an injury to a person’s royalty is an injury to

both that person’s pocketbook and property.

The National Association of WholesalerDistributors (NAW) is the national voice of the

wholesale distribution industry, representing a

crucial link in the automotive and energy supply

chains. NAW’s members operate at the vital nexus

between manufacturers and retailers, facilitating the

efficient distribution of goods and playing an integral

role in the complex web of commercial relationships

that animate the modern economy.

1 Per Supreme Court Rule 37.6, amici confirm that no counsel for

a party authored this brief in whole or in part, and no such

counsel or party made a monetary contribution intended to fund

the preparation or submission of the brief.

1

While they represent different constituencies,

ARC/TRC and NAW together represent many, many

different types of entities harmed by the

Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) actions

underlying this case and the lower court’s erection of

a massive, unwarranted hurdle to judicial review of

the agency’s actions here and agency actions

generally.

The lower court’s elevated redressability

standard will bar amici’s members from pursuing

judicial review of regulatory actions that are clearly

designed to, and will inevitably, cause real harm to

their economic (and even property) interests. This

Court should not let the lower court erect such a

barrier to judicial review in this and future cases.

Accordingly, amici respectfully urge this Court to

reject the lower court’s “redressability” decision.

SUMMARY OF THE ARGUMENT

The lower court knit from whole cloth a new

“redressability” standard that will prevent harmed

entities from challenging the regulatory actions that

harm them. The new standard is not consistent with

the Court’s precedents. This is not a case, for example,

where plaintiffs seek access to federal courts so that

they can potentially stop other governments a world

away from potentially undertaking projects that this

Nation would have no authority to prevent. See Lujan

v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 568–71 (1992);

contra Pet.App.22a, Pet.App.31a. No—in this case,

2

Fuel Petitioners look to challenge regulatory actions

specifically designed to put them out of business.

Pet’rs’ Br. 16. The actions are also intended to harm

amici and their members; that’s the whole point of an

EV Mandate. This Court has not shown an intent to

deny access to federal courts in such a situation.

The lower court’s decision should be seen for

what it is: an attempt (and not the first) to use civil

procedure in hopes of avoiding a clear-eyed look at

economic reality, legality, and the nationwide impacts

of upholding or striking down an EV Mandate and

similar attempts by federal regulators to manipulate

American markets. And in doing so, the lower court

has either created or worsened an unwarranted

procedural “disconnect” that supposedly separates

“civil procedure” from “administrative law as decided

through civil procedure.” In what other ilk of case

could a court slam its doors to a potential plaintiff

because that potential plaintiff had not somehow

coerced a third party to provide record testimony (in a

case that does not yet exist) about how that third

party might react to the harmful actions taken by the

putative defendant? Sure, regulatory actions like the

one at issue in this case bypass the federal district

courts, but there is simply no procedural basis for the

lower court’s imposition of such a hurdle to judicial

review.

The unfortunate result is that lower courts will

continue to, and increasingly will, find ways to let

regulators run roughshod over Americans by

3

inflicting unchecked harm on their economic (and, for

royalty owners, property) interests. Accordingly,

amici respectfully ask the Court to reverse the lower

court’s decision and keep the federal courts’ doors

open to those harmed by regulators.

ARGUMENT

I.

THE LOWER COURT WENT AGAINST

THIS COURT’S PRECEDENTS.

The lower court’s redressability standard is an

unwarranted departure from this Court’s precedent,

which has consistently held that plaintiffs need only

show a likelihood, not a certainty, of redress. See

Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 561

(1992) (articulating the “likely to be redressed”

standard); Simon v. E. Ky. Welfare Rights Org., 426

U.S. 26, 38, 41–42 (1976). By demanding

incontrovertible proof in the form of sworn statements

from third-party automakers guaranteeing specific,

quantifiable reactions to a prospective waiver vacatur,

Pet.App.32a,

the

lower

court

unjustifiably

contravened the pragmatic, consequence-focused

approach this Court has long embraced.

Massachusetts v. EPA, 549 U.S. 497 (2007),

exemplifies the Court’s flexible, real-world-oriented

redressability analysis. There, the Court recognized

that requiring EPA to regulate vehicle emissions

likely would mitigate at least some of the alleged

harms, even if the precise extent of the reduction were

4

uncertain. The Court held that this was at least

sufficient to show redressability and allow the case to

go ahead. Id. at 525–26. The question was whether the

requested relief would yield some meaningful benefit

to the petitioner, however incremental or contingent

on third-party responses. Id. Conspicuously absent

was any suggestion that petitioners tender sworn

commitments detailing the minutely quantifiable

steps third-party entities might take in response to a

successful judicial decision. Id. Going further, the

Court found the alleged harm redressable even

though it was logically certain that a third party likely

would take steps that might worsen—rather than

mitigate—the harm. Id. (“Nor is it dispositive that

developing countries such as China and India are

poised to increase greenhouse gas emissions

substantially over the next century: A reduction in

domestic emissions would slow the pace of global

emissions increases, no matter what happens

elsewhere.”). There was self-evident logic in the

conclusion that a court decision benefitting the

petitioner would at least present the possibility of

some iota of harm reduction.

The practical stance is in line with Friends of

the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Services’

contextual conception of causation. 528 U.S. 167, 185–

86 (2000). The Laidlaw Court considered civil

penalties “likely” to redress environmental injury by

potentially deterring violations and reducing the risk

of harm, even absent definite assurances of a

violator’s future conduct. Id. The Court pragmatically

5

recognized that penalized entities weigh myriad

factors in calibrating behavior to legal decrees, and at

no point did the Court suggest that a sworn,

unconditional pledge of forward-looking compliance—

from a putative third party, no less—was an Article

III sine qua non. Id.

Even Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, on which

the lower court relied, Pet.App.17a, Pet.App.22a,

Pet.App.31a, belies any categorical requirement of

definite third-party assurances. 504 U.S. at 562–67.

Lujan’s plaintiffs lacked standing for many reasons,

including because they did not allege cognizable

injury or non-speculative causation. Id. And with

respect to “redressability,” there was simply no reason

to think that a federal court in America could decide a

question of regulatory lawfulness in a way that would

enable the plaintiffs (or anyone else) to stop other

governments a world away from potentially

undertaking projects that this Nation would have no

authority to prevent. See id. at 568–71. Maybe if,

before filing suit, the Lujan plaintiffs had somehow

secured sworn assurances from Congress and the

President that the U.S. would declare war on any

nation not consulting with American regulators about

endangered species, then the outcome in that case

might have been different. See id. at 571 n.5 (“Seizing

on the fortuity that the case has made its way to this

Court, Justice STEVENS protests that no agency

would ignore an authoritative construction of the ESA

by this Court. In that he is probably correct; in

concluding from it that plaintiffs have demonstrated

6

redressability, he is not.”). But nothing in Lujan made

this or any other such outlandish pre-litigation-thirdparty-testimony scenario the requirement that the

lower court created in this case.

What’s more: here, Fuel Petitioners did

present empirical data, detailed econometric models,

and expert analysis showing how EPA’s actions and

an EV Mandate would harm them. Pet.App.19a–

Pet.App.20a. That is enough to get inside the

courthouse doors. See, e.g., Zenith Radio Corp. v.

Hazeltine Research, Inc., 395 U.S. 100, 123–24 (1969)

(market data and economic expertise can show

antitrust injury).

II.

THE LOWER COURT’S APPROACH

ECONOMIC HARM IGNORES REALITY.

TO

The lower court’s redressability analysis rests

on an oversimplified account of how regulatory acts

impact modern economic systems. As Fuel Petitioners

explain, energy markets are complicated and wideranging, Pet’rs’ Br. 21–22, and EPA’s desired

endgame here is to artificially kill a spectrum of the

energy markets by keeping oil in the ground, see

Pet’rs’ Br. 3. “The entire point [is] to decrease the

amount of liquid fuel burned by drivers.” Pet’rs’ Br. 3.

Accordingly, assuming that an EV Mandate

would only harm automakers defies common sense.

Contra Pet.App.22a. A federal regulatory action

intended to kill the market for liquid fuel will

7

obviously, self-evidently hurt fuel refiners and

providers. See Pet’rs’ Br. 21. And Fuel Petitioners

provided evidence of that at the lower court.

Pet.App.19a–Pet.App.20a.

Going further “downstream,” what about the

businesses that construct service stations and run

them to sell liquid fuel to automobile drivers? What if

an EV Mandate forces them either to close or to spend

money to re-construct so that they are only providing

non-liquid fuels?

What about supply-chain businesses that use

liquid-fuel based automobiles to provide wholesale

distribution of goods throughout the Nation, which is

true of many of NAW’s members? What if an EV

Mandate forces them either to close or to trash their

current fleet and buy non-liquid-fuel automobiles? See

supra, at 1.

Tracking back “upstream,” what about

businesses that make money by constructing and

running the pipelines that move liquid fuels (or their

oil feedstocks) around the Nation? What if an EV

Mandate makes their businesses a dead-letter

because no one will pay them to move oil and liquid

fuel?

What about the oil companies that explore for

oil reserves and make their money by finding,

producing, and selling oil? What if an EV Mandate, by

design, is intended to kill those businesses?

8

And not least, what about the families and

individuals, like ARC’s and TRC’s members, who own

land in this Nation, including land that has oil

reserves? When an oil company wants to produce oil

from their properties, the oil company must pay them

for the right do so. That payment can include a onetime “bonus,” and it can include a recurring royalty

payment that aggregates not just to generational

wealth, but also for many property owners a sole

means of retirement income, a way to pay for medical

expenses etc. What if a regulatory EV Mandate

negates any expectation of income in exchange for

letting an oil company produce oil from their

properties? Those royalty owners suffer too.

None of those many entities or the myriad other

entities harmed by an EV Mandate should have to

coerce an automaker to provide record testimony in a

case that does not yet exist about how that automaker

might react to a regulatory EV Mandate before they

could make it inside a federal courthouse. See Lujan,

504 U.S. at 560–61. In deciding otherwise, the lower

court simply got “redressability” wrong.

The court below did not grasp these market

mechanics, treating automakers collectively as the

sole fulcrum on which the entire outfall of EPA’s

actions would pivot. But no single actor, however

powerful, dictates the trajectory of a vast,

multifaceted sector like energy. The notion that one

private entity even could provide the definite,

9

conclusive assurances the lower court supposedly

needed ignores reality.

And the lower court gave no limiting principle:

is it enough to coerce one automaker to provide

testimony before filing a lawsuit? Would a litigant

need to coerce pre-filing testimony from all the

automakers? All of them selling cars in the United

States? Or selling cars around the world? And for

notice-and-comment rulemaking, how exactly would

the lower court propose that a liquid-fuel provider, or

a supply-chain company, or a royalty owner convince

an automaker (again, where there is no lawsuit yet) to

submit public comment on a proposed regulatory

action that might or might not come to fruition? And

according to the lower court, how should a royalty

owner coerce an automaker to make a public comment

sufficient to convince the lower court that the

automaker will take actions that will directly hurt the

royalty owner?

Here, Fuel Petitioners provided record evidence

showing that EPA’s actions would hurt them. E.g.,

Pet.App.19a–Pet.App.20a. Courts, for example,

regularly rely on analogous evidence to discern

causation in complex statutory settings. See, e.g.,

Associated Gen. Contractors of Cal., Inc. v. Cal. State

Council of Carpenters, 459 U.S. 519, 542 (1983)

(market analysis can show antitrust injury). Article

III demands no more to get inside the courthouse

doors in the first place.

10

III.

THE

LOWER

COURT’S

APPROACH

REFLECTS A PROCEDURAL DISCONNECT

THAT BLOCKS PARTIES HARMED BY A

REGULATION FROM CHALLENGING IT.

At best, the lower court has exposed an

unwarranted procedural “disconnect”—whether one

the lower court created or merely worsened—that

supposedly separates “civil procedure” from

“administrative law as decided through civil

procedure.” Taking the mine-run of civil litigation in

federal courts started per Federal Rule of Civil

Procedure 8, while the plaintiff’s allegations must be

“plausible,” the federal court must accept them as true

without recourse to other evidence (just “judicial

experience and common sense”). See Ashcroft v. Iqbal,

556 U.S. 662, 678–79, (2009). Fed. R. Civ. P. 8 does

not require coerced, pre-litigation, third-party

testimony to get in the courthouse doors. Nothing in

the applicable federal appellate rules erects such a

barrier either. See Fed. R. App. P. 15.

Of course, following Rule 8 gets only one foot in

the courthouse door. The other foot comes from

standing. Our Constitution only lets federal courts

open their doors to actual “Cases” and

“Controversies.” U.S. Const. art. III, § 2, cl. 1. And

there cannot be a case or controversy unless the

plaintiff shows that it has “standing” to bring a case

in the first place. Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560.

11

“Each element [of standing] must be supported

in the same way as any other matter on which the

plaintiff bears the burden of proof, i.e., with the

manner and degree of evidence required at the

successive stages of the litigation.” Lujan, 504 U.S. at

561. So, “at the pleading stage, general factual

allegations of injury resulting from the defendant's

conduct may suffice, [but in] response to a summary

judgment motion . . . the plaintiff can no longer rest

on such ‘mere allegations,’ but must ‘set forth’ by

affidavit or other evidence ‘specific facts.’” Id. At first

then, the lower court’s decision makes some sense.

But wait—in Lujan, the Court did not specify

that the plaintiff had to produce third-party

testimony to meet its “standing” burden at summary

judgment. See id. Sure, that might be a possibility, but

it is not a requirement. Id. at 561–62. Certainly, one

other way is to show by sworn statement that the

plaintiff itself will suffer some actual or imminent

injury from the defendant’s action. Id. at 564.

Here is the disconnect: for cases brought in

federal courts, like the lower court here, under the

Administrative Procedure Act (generally) or the Clean

Air Act provision at issue here, 42 U.S.C. § 7607(b)(1),

judicial review is ordinarily confined to the

administrative record and discovery is not allowed.

E.g., Amfac Resorts, L.L.C. v. U.S. Dep’t of the Interior,

143 F. Supp. 2d 7, 10 (D.D.C. 2001) (APA); Harrison

v. PPG Indus., Inc., 446 U.S. 578, 593 (1980) (CAA) (if

Congress had intended 42 U.S.C. § 7607(b)(1) cases to

12

include “the tools of discovery,” then it would have

said so). Consequently, a putative litigant challenging

a regulatory action like the one at issue in this case

must obtain any evidence from a third-party nonlitigant before filing its lawsuit. But how?

Sure enough, in this case, Fuel Petitioners

brought evidence to the lower court. E.g.,

Pet.App.19a–Pet.App.20a. But how were they

supposed to coerce even a single automaker, much less

many of or all the automakers, to provide testimonial

evidence of what those automakers would or even

might do? Going further, how were Fuel Petitioners

supposed to adduce that sort of statement from the

automakers in a publicly filed rulemaking comment?

Fuel Petitioners would have no “tools of discovery”

there. The lower court has no answers.

And just as surely, the lower court refused to

allow application of any “tools of discovery” in this

case. Pet.App.30a. In the lower court’s words, “After

oral argument, Fuel Petitioners filed a motion to

supplement the record and to file a supplemental brief

regarding their standing.” Id. But the lower court

denied the request. Id. Read charitably, the lower

court left open a door for post-petition discovery by

citing its prior decision in Sierra Club v. EPA, 292

F.3d 895 (D.C. Cir. 2002). Id. at Pet.App.30a–

Pet.App.31a. But nothing about the lower court’s prior

decision suggests that it would ever allow thirdparty discovery to show standing after the

petitioner has begun its request for review. See Sierra

13

Club, 292 F.3d at 900–01. And nothing about Lujan

addresses whether lower courts in APA or 42 U.S.C.

§ 7607(b)(1) cases will, must, or could allow thirdparty discovery to show standing after a petitioner

starts its case. See Lujan, 504 U.S. at 561–62.

That brings us full-circle to the disconnect: a

court cannot require third-party testimony to show

standing in a record-review case. And the lower court

should not have demanded it here.

IV.

LOWER COURTS MUST PROVIDE A CHECK

ON REGULATORY OVERREACH.

The lower court’s mistaken new standard also

implicates

check-and-balance

problems.

Our

constitutional order rests on each branch of federal

government

policing

encroachments

on

its

prerogatives. See, e.g., Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co.

v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579, 593–94 (1952) (Frankfurter,

J., concurring). A federal court’s unwillingness to

check administrative power threatens that equipoise.

See City of Arlington v. FCC, 569 U.S. 290, 315 (2013)

(Roberts, C.J., dissenting) (“It would be a bit much to

describe the result as ‘the very definition of tyranny,’

but the danger posed by the growing power of the

administrative state cannot be dismissed.”).

The federal courts’ Article III duty to hear cases

and

controversies

is

a

bulwark

against

“administrative state” “tyranny.” See id.; see also

Loper Bright Enters. v. Raimondo, 603 U.S. 369, 384

(2024). This is not a duty that the lower federal courts

14

can abdicate by erecting barriers to fair, neutral

judicial review in cases challenging federal regulatory

actions. Id. at 412. Yet as Fuel Petitioners describe,

this case is one in a series where the lower court has

manufactured procedural hurdles to avoid its

obligation to definitively decide the lawfulness of

various “California waiver” and other EV Mandate

actions. See Pet’rs’ Br. 8–9, 13–15, 35–45.

By

reversing

the

lower

court

on

“redressability,” this Court can force the lower court

to meaningfully address the regulatory overreach

complained of in this case.

V.

COURTS

SHOULD

NOT

LET

REGULATORS RUN ROUGHSHOD OVER

AMERICAN MARKETS.

The lower court’s decision defies common sense

and threatens “Main Street America” nationwide. On

common sense, the structural separation of powers

and need for basic regulatory accountability require a

redressability standard that acknowledges the

Executive Branch’s profound ability to influence

markets.

Amici’s interests in this case amplify Fuel

Petitioners’ primary point: federal regulatory actions

can cause harm far beyond the most directly regulated

“target.” See Pet’rs’ Br. 33–34. Here, the regulators’

policy that forces automakers to stop making fossilfuel-based automobiles obviously also hurts the

entities that make and sell those fuels, id., the entities

15

like NAW’s members who will have to replace vehicle

fleets with electric vehicles, see supra, at 1, 2 and the

entities like ARC’s and TRC’s members who rely on

fossil-fuel-production for income, see id.

As a practical matter, an unnecessarily

formalistic redressability standard premised on an

inert concept of markets will also harm the entities

whose welfares hinge on a stable regulatory process:

the businesses and entrepreneurs that drive growth

and innovation. See supra, at 1.

“Main Street” businesses, more than perhaps

any other segment of the Nation’s economy, stand the

most to lose if this Court adopts such a formalistic

approach to deciding who can challenge a regulation

in court. Amici represent a broad cross-section of the

American economy, including small businesses and

property owners nationwide. They suffer a shared

harm stemming from the lower court’s redressability

2 See also, e.g., PwC, Merge Ahead: Electric Vehicles and the

Impact

on

the

Automotive

Supply

Chain,

https://www.pwc.com/us/en/industrialproducts/publications/assets/pwc-merge-ahead-electric-vehiclessupply-chain.pdf (last visited Jan. 31, 2025) (describing the

challenges that transitioning to electric vehicles will impose on

wholesaler-distributors (among others) even just within the

auto-manufacturing industry). Aside from replacing fleets, there

are potential harms inherent merely in figuring out how to

supply the parts for electric vehicles. Id. at 8 (“Suppliers that

aren’t ready to meet the challenges that rising EV adoption will

bring could present a risk to automobile manufacturers at the

same time as their own business is evolving.”).

16

standard: a future inability to challenge further

market-distorting decisions—like an EV Mandate—

foist upon them by federal regulators. See supra, at 1.

Consider the plight of amici’s royalty-owning

members, many of whom are individuals and families

whose livelihoods depend on the income streams

generated by the network of exploration and

production, transportation, refining, and distribution

enterprises that are threatened—purposefully

targeted—by an EV Mandate. For the royalty owners,

the oil-and-gas concerns working on and in their

properties are not faceless corporate entities; they are

often independent businesses whose continued

operations and relationships with the royalty owners

underwrite the royalty owners’ economic security and

their communities’ fiscal health.

The lower court created a new “redressability”

hurdle that a litigant could never be expected to cross

in a case like this. What’s more, the lower court

refused to allow use of the “tools of discovery” to cross

that hurdle. But the creation of that hurdle was

premised on a myopic view of the impacts of EPA’s

actions throughout this Nation and on the disconnect

separating cases like this one from traditional civil

litigation. As a result, the lower court has wrongfully

abdicated its duty to meaningfully assess the

regulatory actions in this case and more generally the

devastation that a regulatorily imposed EV Mandate

will have nationwide.

17

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, amici respectfully

ask this Court to reverse the lower court.

Respectfully submitted,

Ivan L. London

Counsel of Record

MOUNTAIN STATES

LEGAL FOUNDATION

2596 South Lewis Way

Lakewood, Colorado 80227

(303) 292-2021

ilondon@mslegal.org

February 3, 2025

Attorney for Amici Curiae

18

This is a copy of a public record, reproduced as it was published. It is not legal advice, and it may not be the version a court would rely on. Check the official source before you cite it.

A word about cookies

We need a few to keep you signed in and the library working. The rest help us see which pages people use and where they get stuck. They stay off unless you say yes.