Whitewater Draw Natural Resource Conservation District v. Johnson

The U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari in a case in which the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected claims that the federal government failed to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in connection with certain immigration programs and policies, including Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. The certiorari petition—which raised the questions of whether the Department of Homeland Security’s NEPA procedures constituted reviewable final agency action and whether the Ninth Circuit improperly denied standing to the petitioners based on an erroneous standard—asserted that “[i]mmigrants and their children almost universally are responsible for significantly more greenhouse gas emissions than they would have been if they never emigrated from their home countries,” and that the Biden administration’s “heightened focus on greatly augmenting the population through the expansion of the pathways of immigration to the U.S.” was “at cross purposes” with the administration’s greenhouse gas emissions reduction goals.

Parties filed a petition for writ of certiorari after the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected their claims that the federal government failed to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act in connection with certain immigration programs and policies, including Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. The petitioners asserted, among other things, that “[i]mmigrants and their children almost universally are responsible for significantly more greenhouse gas emissions than they would have been if they never emigrated from their home countries,” and that the Biden administration’s “heightened focus on greatly augmenting the population through the expansion of the pathways of immigration to the U.S.” was “at crosspurposes with” the administration’s greenhouse gas emissions reduction goals. The certiorari petition raised the question of whether the Department of Homeland Security’s NEPA procedures constituted reviewable final agency action. The petition also presented the question of whether the Ninth Circuit improperly denied standing to the petitioners based on an erroneous standard.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed judgment in favor of the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security on claims that the Department violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by failing to consider environmental impacts of certain immigration programs and policies. The plaintiffs—identified as environmentalists, environmental groups, natural resource conservation districts, and cattle ranchers—alleged, among other things, that the immigration actions resulted in increased greenhouse gas emissions. The Ninth Circuit found that a manual that described how the Department would implement NEPA was not a final agency action subject to review under the Administrative Procedure Act, and that immigration “programs” challenged by the plaintiffs, including Temporary Protective Status and long-term nonimmigrant visas, were not discrete agency actions subject to review. The Ninth Circuit ruled that the plaintiffs did not have standing for their remaining claims.

Finding that the plaintiffs failed to establish standing, the court granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment.