Healthy Gulf v. Burgum

Environmental organizations filed a lawsuit asking the federal district court for the District of Columbia to vacate the final notice of sale for the first of 30 oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico required by the July 4, 2025 Reconciliation Act (also referred to as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act). The organizations asserted that the federal defendants violated the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS); the organizations contended that nothing in the Reconciliation Act exempted the Bureau of Ocean and Energy Management (BOEM) from NEPA obligations. The complaint alleged that the BOEM failed to take a hard look at the environmental effects of the lease sale and to consider a reasonable range of alternatives. To the extent BOEM relied on a programmatic EIS released in August 2025, the organizations contended the analysis was inadequate. In addition, the plaintiffs asserted that defendants’ actions were arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, and not in accordance with law due to the “extensive involvement” of BOEM’s acting director whose participation was prohibited by ethics rule and direction from the Department of the Interior Ethics Office.