Loper Bright Oral Arguments Get Mixed Reception at D.C. Circuit

The remanded Loper Bright case met a divided federal appeals court during oral arguments Monday, as D.C. Circuit judges split statutory hairs and dissected federal fishing laws’ history after the Supreme Court articulated a new judicial review standard.

While the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia was skeptical of the government’s arguments that fishing boat observers were inherently beneficial to the industry, the panel shot down the fishermen’s interpretation of the high court’s opinion overturning of Chevron deference, the principle that courts should defer to federal agency statutory interpretation if reasonable.

The usual canons ...