State of Alaska v. Jewell

Two petitions for writ of certiorari were filed in the United States Supreme Court seeking review of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision upholding the designation of critical habitat for the polar bear. The State of Alaska, Alaska native communities, Alaska Oil and Gas Association, and American Petroleum Institute asked the Court to take up the question of whether the Ninth Circuit’s “exceedingly permissive standard” for critical habitat designation allowed it to designate “huge geographic areas,” much of which allegedly failed to meet statutory criteria, as critical habitat. Alaska Oil and Gas Association and American Petroleum Institute told the Court that the Ninth Circuit’s “exceptionally lax and inexact standard” for the specificity with which the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) must make critical habitat designations allowed FWS to impose “sweeping designations” without regard to whether all areas were critical or even helpful to species conservation. Alaska and Alaska native communities told the court that FWS’s “hugely overbroad approach” threatened the viability of “longstanding, Native human communities.”