When President-elect Donald Trump arrives at the White House next year, any ambitions he has to unwind Biden-era environmental regulations may meet a hurdle of his own making: the death of the Chevron doctrine.
Before the Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority — three members of which Trump appointed during his first four years in office —overturned Chevron in June, federal judges for 40 years had generally deferred to agencies like EPA when they interpreted ambiguities in statutes like the Clean Air Act.
While the court’s decision to end Chevron was seen as a blow for the power of President Joe Biden and future Democratic administrations to address climate change, public health emergencies and other important issues, legal observers noted at the time that the disappearance of the doctrine would also hamper a Republican president’s power to roll back environmental protections and write their own regulations.
Trump’s next four years in office will test that theory.
