Legal Planet

1 week ago | legal-planet.org | Daniel A. Farber

Trump has spared no effort to ensure that the government ignores the needs of vulnerable communities. There has been a systematic war of elimination against protections for vulnerable communities. This includes not only any protections for minority communities, but also those for poor communities, minority or white. While initiated by Trump, the effort has included a ream of destructive follow-on actions.  The best way to make the point is a chronological account. Jan. 20.

2 weeks ago | legal-planet.org | Daniel A. Farber

Here’s how the APA bolsters the rule of law and protects the environment. Seventy-nine years ago, President Harry Truman signed a law that, to this day, most Americans have never heard of. Even the title of the law — the Administrative Procedure Act or APA — is a guaranteed yawner.  Yet this law is central to the rule of law and, among other things, to environmental protection.

2 weeks ago | legal-planet.org | Daniel A. Farber

“Beautiful clean coal”, as Trump calls it, is inexorably declining. On May 23, the Trump Administration issued an emergency order to keep a coal-fired power plant open, even though the owner and the state utility commission both wanted to close it.  That’s in line with Administration policy.

3 weeks ago | legal-planet.org | Daniel A. Farber

Schedule F was bad, But Trump’s latest move is even worse. The Trump Administration has adopted new hiring procedures that will impose ideological litmus tests in federal hiring. Job applicants will be graded on essays about their allegiance to “America’s founding principles” and their commitment to implementing Trump’s executive orders. These new essay questions have little to do with the jobs of most government  employees and more to do with ideological conformity.

3 weeks ago | legal-planet.org | Chloe Smith

As Congress votes to undermine California’s sovereignty to set supply-side standards on polluting vehicles, CLEE’s research shows why these policies are so effective In May 2025, both the U.S. House and Senate passed resolutions to revoke California’s Clean Air Act waivers, which allow the state to enforce stricter vehicle emissions rules than federal standards (see Ann Carlson’s post on this issue).