The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) (collectively referred to as the “Agencies”) proposed on April 17, 2025, to remove the definition of “harm” under their respective...more
On May 14, 2021, the Department of Justice filed a brief with the Supreme Court arguing that the Court should not hear the case of Kansas Natural Resource Coalition v. Department of Interior (“KNRC”). KNRC is a challenge to a...more
A common tactic by competitors is to seek adversaries’ (or even supply-chain partners’) data that is maintained by the United States, an individual state, or even municipal governmental agencies. These efforts are meant to...more
On March 4, 2021, the US Supreme Court held that draft biological opinions prepared by the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) were subject to the deliberative process privilege...more
Last week, in Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s first signed opinion, the U.S. Supreme Court expanded the deliberative process privilege under exception 5 of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), limiting litigants’ ability to...more
Today, in U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service et al. v. Sierra Club Inc., Case No. 19-547, the United States Supreme Court struck down a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals’ ruling that the federal government was required to turn over...more
On March 4, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court decided United States Fish and Wildlife Service et al. v. Sierra Club, Inc., holding that the deliberative process privilege exemption in the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) protects...more
Comment period on FWS/NMFS proposal will close soon. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service have proposed that a definition of “habitat” be added to the Endangered Species Act. The...more
Decision creates difficult permitting challenges for oil and gas pipelines crossing jurisdictional waters. Oil and gas pipelines continue to face difficult permitting challenges as Ninth Circuit declines to revive vacated...more