Today, Senate President Martin M. Looney (D-New Haven) and Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff (D-Norwalk) issued the following statement following the Supreme Court’s 6-2 decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo and Relentless, Inc. v. Dept. of Commerce to overturn deference to agencies called “Chevron deference.” This precedent had been a foundation for administrative law since the Supreme Court ruled in the 1984 case Chevron v NRDC.
“This decision throws our country into a dangerous new legal paradigm. This ruling allows for judges to be the end-all, be-all deciding factors of any number of issues in years to come, forcing government into more and more narrow circumstances and neutering any power government has to prevent abuse and misuse of our systems. Judges now deem themselves experts in everything rather than relying on the subject matter experts at agencies in our state and federal governments. This ruling will subvert government’s capacity to do its job, adopt appropriate regulations, and uphold the standards of our society, leading to significant waste of taxpayer dollars. It sets up a confusing and ineffective future for government – which is perhaps what some Republican leaders want in the first place.”
