The ruling Thursday from Judge James Cain of the Western District of Louisiana makes permanent a temporary hold he issued in January.
Cain, an appointee of former President Trump, sided with the state of Louisiana in prohibiting the EPA’s Office of External Civil Rights Compliance and the Justice Department from enforcing the provision “against any entity in the State of Louisiana, or requiring compliance with those requirements as a condition of past, existing, or future awards of financial assistance to any entity in the State of Louisiana.”
The judge ruled in January that the Civil Rights Act only authorizes enforcement in cases of intentional discrimination.
That ruling came shortly after the EPA announced it was ending an investigation into “Cancer Alley,” a predominantly Black and low-income section of Louisiana that is a hub of petrochemical production and has disproportionately high cancer rates relative to the country at large.
Cain declined a request from the federal government to dismiss Louisiana’s case after the end of the investigation, ruling that the state still had a right to “unambiguous clarity concerning Defendants’ power to regulate beyond the plain text of Title VI.”
Read more at TheHill.com.
