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These include a massive open-pit copper mine near Tucson, Arizona, and a proposed heavy mineral sand mine outside of Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia, home to a National Wildlife Refuge and National Wildlife Area.
The issue of federally regulated streams and wetlands has been a source of intense debate almost since the passage of the Clean Water Act, and has been a legal and political quagmire for the past decade and a half after the Supreme Court handed down a pair. From the confused opinions that created enormous confusion on the ground.
Over the past two presidential administrations, the country has been switching back and forth between three different regulatory definitions, sometimes with different rules in place in different parts of the country.
Although these regulations are strongly felt by housing developers, coal miners, and oil and gas companies, the issue has gained significant prominence among the farming community, despite the fact that most farming practices are exempt from the law. When the Obama administration drafted an expanded definition of protected waterways in 2015, the agricultural state revolted, launching an aggressive political campaign that argued that federal bureaucrats would regulate dry ditches and rain puddles.
Reagan, who worked closely with farmers and ranchers in his previous job as head of North Carolina’s Division of Environmental Quality, won broad support from farming groups when Biden appointed him to lead the Environmental Protection Agency.
In his statement Wednesday, Reagan said he is committed to crafting a new, more protective definition that is “permanent,” consistent with Supreme Court precedent, and informed by lessons from previous regulations. The agency has already committed to holding public awareness sessions across the country this summer and fall.
But a compromise in the decades-long battle appears to be a long one, with environmental groups firmly holding a strong position on broad protection.
“It’s a hallucination” to think that any kind of agreement could be reached between the long-warring parties, Patrick Barento, a professor at Vermont Law School, told POLITICO last month.
Any rule the Biden administration finalizes will immediately face judicial challenges, and many legal experts believe the problem will only really be resolved if the Supreme Court rules again or if Congress steps in to clarify the problem.
In conjunction with its announcement, the EPA on Wednesday asked a district court in Massachusetts, where green groups have been defying Trump’s rule, to return the matter to the agency.
Repealing and replacing the Trump rule is a years-long regulatory process, and the agency said earlier rules, issued in 1986 and amended through the directive, will be in effect in the meantime.
But it’s unclear what will happen to the thousands of jurisdiction decisions that have already been made under Trump’s narrower law. Reversing it is a top priority for environmental groups, but the Army Corps of Engineers, which issues the resolutions and works with the Environmental Protection Agency on the new base, typically considers it a good five-year habit.
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