The move, expected as early as Monday, relies on a 70-year-old law that could make it difficult for the Trump administration to reverse it.
  • iAmTheTot
    552·
    5 days ago

    If one president can permanently ban it, the next can permanently allow it. As if Trump cabinet will care about law, anyway.

    • MrMakabar@slrpnk.netEnglish
      493·
      5 days ago

      It is based on the 1953 Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, which allows presidents to protect waters, but it does not allow for that permission to be revoked. So if Trump wants to revoke it, he has to change the law. The Democrats will try to slow it down and the legal system in the US works well enough to allow such projects to be put on hold for some time. It probably is not going to stop Trump, but it will slow things down, which is good.

      • ramble81@lemm.ee
        23·
        5 days ago

        “By executive order I’m allowing you to drill here” drilling starts
        Company gets sued
        Makes its way to SCOTUS
        SCOTUS rules it’s okay based on the earlier case about presidential acts being legal while in office

        This is a perfect test for that ruling to give it credibility and make it stand up.

      • brlemworld@lemmy.world
        11·
        4 days ago

        By that logic Biden should make every single piece of water that touches the US protected and then force Trump to be the most pro environmental president ever! DO IT NOW BIDEN ADMINISTRATION!!!

    • silence7@slrpnk.netOPM
      63·
      5 days ago

      It’s not that simple; it will require either courts to invalidate part of a law, or congress to change the law

      • theonlytruescotsmanEnglish
        13·
        5 days ago

        Or the companies to do it anyway, and the president gives police protection to prevent any court officers from enacting any judgement against the company.

  • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz
    1·
    3 days ago

    Better to have done this than not to have done this… but the republicans have the supreme court and violently do not care about the rules. The mainstream media has also preemptively surrendered to this wave of fascism.

    Given that context it feels very dangerous to engage in the fantasy thinking that these types of actions will pose more than a roadbump to fascists in power, not saying we shouldn’t do them just I think we are all still stuck in some way or another in a mode of thinking where we want to believe we can win the game by playing by rules that our enemy was specifically elected to destroy because the general population is angry and desperate.

    Buckle up :(